


eiectus

by armethaumaturgy



Series: eiectusverse [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Underfell (Undertale), Alternate Universe - Underswap (Undertale), Bad Jokes, Banter, Blood and Injury, Bonding, Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Love, Canon-Typical Violence, Contemplating Love and Stuff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Language, Idiot in Denial, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Love Confessions, M/M, Miscommunication, Nightmares, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Panic Attacks, Protectiveness, Riddles, Romantic Tension, Slow Burn, as they will be needed, fighting as a metaphor for love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:54:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 23
Words: 49,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27122108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/armethaumaturgy/pseuds/armethaumaturgy
Summary: He glanced towards the boarded up door to their basement, considering his Plan Z. He didn't know if it would work.But as more of Papyrus' blood seeped into his jacket, bleeding through his shirt so he could feel it on his bare bones, his mind was made up for him.-Red decides to try and rewind time to save himself and his brother from imminent death. Instead of rewinding time, however, he gets them stranded in a different universe. A universe so very different from their own, he's not sure he can stand it.
Relationships: Papyrus & Sans (Undertale), Red/Blue, Sans/Sans (Undertale)
Series: eiectusverse [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2075106
Comments: 117
Kudos: 151





	1. red's last chance to not fuck up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include: despriptions of blood/injury and violence

Sans was never one of the strongest monsters.

His lingering mental problems notwithstanding, right now he meant physical strength. Living on shitty rations, with the occasional visit to Grillby's, made his magic strong enough to keep up with Papyrus in battle with no trouble, but lugging his brother's limp body  _ after _ a fight was truly pushing the boundaries of his already-drained reserves.

“Sans, put me down, I can walk m—”

“Shut the fuck up, Pap,” Sans bit out, effectively and quickly doing just that as he kept his eyelights trained on their house. Even his dumb teleport had been off, placing them in the middle of the main street instead of their porch as he had intended. So now he was stuck half supporting, half dragging Papyrus towards said house, sweat pouring down his skull in rivulets.

Papyrus grumbled something, but Sans opted to ignore it. He felt the blood seeping through his hoodie, but he wasn't sure at this point if it was his or Papyrus'. He decided not to dwell on it past craning his head to see if his brother was still awake. Awake, sure, but definitely not aware, with the way his head kept lolling to the side, into the fluff of Sans' hood.

Well, shit.

The fight wasn't supposed to go this way. Then again, when was any fight ever supposed to go this way? It was just the bunny gang, stirring up trouble at the outskirts of Snowdin, and Papyrus had been assigned to deal with it, so naturally, Sans was, as well.

Papyrus hadn't bothered with long theatrics or explanations, pulling out a slew of bone attacks as soon as none of the bunnies stepped down at his…  _ prompt _ . “Come peacefully, or come as a pile of dust,” were his words verbatim, and they'd made Sans snort.

None of them had, and it was pure instinct to raise a bone platform under himself and Papyrus to dodge a series of bullets flying at them. Papyrus had jumped off of it, holding a sharpened bone construct in one hand and aiming for the biggest of the bunch, using the momentum of Sans' upwards motion to propel himself.

There had been a blaster waiting behind Papyrus, and he had swerved to the right as the bunny dodged, getting caught in the blast just as predicted.

The rest of the fight should've been that simple as well.

But no, instead he'd gotten cornered by a couple of them from behind, and his brother had to come to his rescue because the knife held up to his cervical vertebrae would've definitely been enough to deplete his five measly fucking HP. 

So Papyrus had to take a slash meant for him and gotten dogpiled by fucking bunnies, of all things. Red didn't remember much after that, courtesy of being clubbed across the skull, but by the stars did he fucking stay alive, even if with one HP and no small amount of stubbornness, and wretched Papyrus out to use the rest of his energy on the teleport that didn't even do what it was supposed to.

Which put them into now, trudging through dusty and gross sludge. Add waterlogged shorts to his list of ruined clothes today.

Standing at the foot of their porch steps, he weighed his options. Undyne was out of the question immediately; his teleport didn't work the first time, so any consecutive tries would only be worse, and he wasn't going to risk stranding them both in the middle of the fucking void. The pantry looked like it always did the week leading up to ration distributing day, so that was out of question too. They were out of healing salves as well, he knew firsthand, and he couldn't heal Papyrus if he was three steps from dusting himself.

So, all things considered, they were screwed.

Sans grit his teeth, adjusting Papyrus' weight on his shoulder. Yeah, he was definitely out by now, even more of a dead weight than during the trek. Sans' knees clacked as they trembled under the pressure of holding him up.

He glanced towards the boarded up door to their basement, considering his Plan Z. He didn't know if it would work.

But as more of Papyrus' blood seeped into his jacket, bleeding through his shirt so he could feel it on his bare bones, his mind was made up for him.

"A'ight, Pap, yer probably gonna hate me fer this," he said to the unconscious skeleton as he lugged them both towards the door. He'll take Papyrus hating him for not sharing information over them both being dust swept away by the morning blizzard.

He had to set his brother down as he pried the door open, straining as gravity worked against him. Then came the worse part, getting Papyrus down the set of stairs into the basement proper. Up the stairs? Would've been fine, but he didn't trust himself much going down. 

It took him an embarrassingly long time to get down the ten steps with his brother, but by the stars did he make sure Papyrus wasn’t jostled more than absolutely necessary.

The basement was dusty, wind carrying through the gaps of the old door and bringing with it the remains of anyone unfortunate enough to be dusted in Snowdin, but the light worked and when Sans flicked it on, the low, flickering bulb bathed them in its dying shine. His work table was a mess of blueprints and screwdrivers, left forgotten each time he had been pulled away from his little pet project. One of the drawers was halfway open, showcasing his emergency stash of food. All cheap parts of the rations given to them each month, only able to heal a couple HP at best each, but he grabbed a handful of the little monster candies and kneeled in front of Papyrus to pry his teeth apart.

One by one he shoved the candies into his brother’s mouth, mentally kicking himself for not having anything more substantial. Of course a single candy would be enough for  _ him _ , but not for Papyrus. When he ran out, only sticky wrappers left scattered on the already messy floor, Papyrus’ health didn’t look much better.

But anything was better than the imminent threat of him dusting in Sans’ hands, so, whatever. He’ll take it.

The machine was sitting in its corner, wires unplugged and display dark. Reconnecting it to the power line took no time at all, but as he stared at the now lit up display, asking him for coordinates, he hesitated. He'd just… punch in the date and time of this morning, and it'd be like nothing happened.

Right?

So he did just that, getting blood all over the console in the process, but the machine took his numbers and ran with them, whirring to life with a couple mechanical (and loud) clacks. A portal opened on the wall next to it, a swirling mass of gray and white, and he tried his best to push his overflowing panic to the deep recesses of his mind.

He'd have time to have a panic attack later, when they were both safe, the bunny gang dealt with, and Undyne's report finished. He wouldn't get upset if everything turned out okay. Maybe Paps'd even hold him through it, if he waited until his work was done. 

Yeah, that sounded nice.

Trying to heave his brother's body up made him acutely aware of the fact that he was still at one HP, bleeding down the back of his shirt, out of magic, and now out of healing candies. He was an idiot, no way around it. 

But that didn't matter. 

The portal crackled with energy as soon as hed gotten close to it, and he had to once again pause. He hadn't tested the machine yet, didn't have the time to. It had only been fixed for a couple days. If it somehow fucked up… if it broke midway, or he'd reassembled it wrong, or the coordinates were nonsensical, they'd end up stranded in the middle of nothing. Just like 'Dings had. No, this was his only chance to save his brother, and by the stars, he was _ not _ passing it up.

Holding Papyrus close to his chest as tight as he dared with both their injuries, he took that last step.

The world turned upside-down, topsy-turvy, and everything was gone. For a split second, he feared his anxieties were correct, they were stranded in the void, never to be found—!

But then gravity and air returned and he was tumbling to the ground, landing in a messy pile of bones on the freshly-fallen snow of Snowdin. Papyrus landed on top of him, knocking the wind out of Sans as he pressed straight into the cut on his hip, but at the very least, he didn't seem worse off than before.

Sans' eyelights were flickering, his vision blackening around the corners, but he'd looked around, scanning the horizon for any traces of trouble. Out in the open as they were now, they were nothing more than free EXP. A feeling nagged at the back of his mind, a thought of 'if we successfully reset time, shouldn't our injuries be gone?', but as the darkness crept ever so fast across his vision, he couldn't concentrate on it.

The snow crunched under the heels of his beat up sneakers. Belatedly, he realized there must've been snow  _ in _ them, too. Another article on his ruined clothes list. His knees kept wobbling.

As he neared their house - or what he thought was their house; everything seemed too bright even with his darkening sight - they gave out completely, and he collapsed back into the shin-high snow, dragging his brother along. He didn't have enough energy to stand up again.

As if through a long tunnel, he heard yelling, but for the life of him, he couldn't discern any words.

So, this was where they'd die.

Fuck.

"'msorry, Paps," he mumbled, with the last of his strength gripping onto his brother's sleeve.

Then he was out.


	2. treason of the non-existent king

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a cursory check.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include: vomitting, violence and descriptions of injuries. please let me know if anything else needs to be warned about

“—and that's when I told her we should really move our training into Snowdin, because I mean—! It'll help her too, deal with the weather and stuff. She always complains about the cold, and she's the coolest guard, and the strongest, so she needs to be able to work in any condition…”

Papyrus nodded along, only halfway listening as Sans regaled him with his tales of the newest training session. “Smart thinking,” he told his brother, shoving his hands into the pocket of his hoodie. Snowdin’s wind was especially biting today.

"But of course!" Sans laughed, "The Magnificent Sans has only the brightest of ideas!"

Papyrus couldn't help the smile tugging at the corner of his teeth. "You're right, bro, how could anyone doubt…" He trailed off, brow bones furrowing as he caught sight of something buried in the snow a little away. Something red and… fluffy? His feet turned in its direction on instinct, curiosity and maybe a bit of worry fueling him. It might've been one of the kids who'd gotten hurt.

"Papy?" Sans called after him, but he caught up with Papyrus' longer strides with minimal effort, "What's wrong?"

"There's something here," he said as they neared the red lump, half-buried in the snow. His soul skipped a beat as he realized it really was someone stuck, and not just one someone.

Two people.

Sans sprung into action first, beating Papyrus' stunned paralyzation by a split second. He was on his knees the next one, tugging at the fluff of one of their hoods. "Papy! C'mon, help me get them up!" 

That broke Papyrus out of his stupor and he leaned down as well, prying the larger figure out of the other's grip, which was strong even when unconscious. That's when he realized the next shocking thing - these were skeletons. He'd never seen any other skeletons aside from himself and Sans, and the man offering boat rides across the river, but he didn't have the time to dwell on it.

The larger figure was nestled in his arms before he realized he was now covered in marrow. The snow around where the two had been had turned a striking red. There must've been a lot of it.

Sans had the other figure, a little bigger than himself, thrown over his shoulder and he turned his eyelights towards Papyrus, nodding towards their house.

Papyrus didn't need to be told twice. Or even once. He adjusted his grip on his charge and grabbed his brother's free wrist. 

With a moment to let Sans gather himself, he teleported them inside, their shoes tracking snow onto their living room's carpet.

"Shoot," Sans swore in his usual manner, stumbling a step or two as he regained his bearings. 

"Sorry, bro."

Sans just shook his head. "It's fine. Drastic situations call for drastic measures, mweheh." He didn't sound as chipper anymore, his laugh lacking its luster. "The Magnificent Sans can deal with a bit of vertigo. He deals with life's  _ twists _ as they come."

"Heh, good one," Papyrus conceded. Having made sure his brother was alright (more than alright, now grinning at his own awful joke), he took to the staircase, going steps two at a time as he carried the skeleton to his room.

Sans was right behind him, only uttering a small groan when Papyrus opened his door with a foot and let his brother see the mess he'd accumulated since their last cleaning day. He opted to carry the other skeleton to his own room, and thus were their tasks confirmed.

He placed the skeleton onto his bed and took his first good look at him. All gangly limbs and thin frame, and  _ the marrow— _

As he lifted the man's top to pull out his soul and the green glow of his healing magic filled the dim room, he couldn’t get the similarities out of his mind. This skeleton looked like him. Well, if he had just walked out of Underground’s number one grungy clothes store, but still.

His magic seeped into the cracked soul (and wasn’t that a sight Papyrus was going to pretend he hadn’t seen?) and the numerous cuts and scratches along the other’s bones slowly started to mend. The worst was by far the jagged cut running vertically across the left side of his ribs, some of them almost broken off altogether and only hanging on by thin wisps of magic. He was… going to find a bucket to expel whatever magic he still had in him after this.

And he was burning through his magic  _ quick _ . There were still many injuries left, and the cut hadn’t even started to mend when he was starting to get drained, so he sat back with a sigh. A cursory check told him that the skeleton’s health was stable, but it told him so much more, too.

> Papyrus LV 5 ATK 60 DEF 50
> 
> HP 309/1400
> 
> Lieutenant of the Underground’s Royal Guard. He's stronger with his brother. 

Alright.

Papyrus stood up, and in the split second that it took him to do so, had decided he needed the bucket.

Right now.

Immediately.

As soon as he made it into the bathroom adjacent to his bedroom and procured said bucket, he proceeded to expel any magic left in him in orange chunks. It didn’t make him feel any better, but he was about ninety percent sure he couldn’t feel much worse at the moment, either.

Thinking he might’ve misread, he repeated his check, only to be met with the same information. It didn't make more sense the second time, either.

He pulled a spare bottle of honey from his inventory and tipped it back against his teeth, shaking his head. He can work on more healing when he replenishes his magic, but he'd much rather check up on Sans. Though if he was being honest with himself - which he wasn't, thank you very much - he didn't want to check up on Sans.

He wanted to check on the other half-dusted skeleton.

The honey clung to his non-existent throat, sweet on his tongue, and he took generous sips as he made his way towards his brother's room. Stars, he could've gone for a smoke. (Or even one of Sans' tacos. Or two. Don't tell anyone.)

* * *

Sans woke up feeling like his limbs had turned into molasses, and the very first thing he became aware of was the pounding headache at the back of his skull. Neither of these things were enough to make him open his sockets, especially when he could feel the warmth of healing magic washing over him in short little waves.

He didn't know how long he'd laid there, floating between sleep and wakefulness, but it was warm and Papyrus wasn't yelling at him to come to work yet. All was well in the world.

He only roused when he could feel the familiar tingle along his spine, a telltale feeling of his brother checking him. But it felt all off; it wasn't his brother's cursory glance at his HP to see if his most recent nap gave him one or two extra points to work with. No, this feeling lodged itself at the base of his spine, spreading unease there like only a budding anxiety would.

He chuckled - or tried to. His voice was fucked ten ways to Sunday, and broke halfway. "'mfine, Paps, y'know me," he groaned out, waiting for the feeling to fade. But it didn't. So he waited a little longer, that awful feeling spreading upwards from his spine through his body until it almost reached his soul with its swirling wrongness.

His throat protested his mind's idea of a warning growl. "Really, bro, cut't out. 'mnot made of fuck'n glass."

Peeling his sockets open was a monumental task in itself, but when he did, the world around him seemed to swim, eyelights not wanting to focus no matter how hard he tried.

He was in Papyrus' room, that much he could tell even with limited sight. But there were splotches of blue blurs all around, and the walls were a bright enough white to make his headache pound even more. And someone was leaning over him.

It wasn't Papyrus.

"Get the fuck offa me!" 

If he'd been having trouble waking up before, he most certainly didn't anymore. He sprung up, ignoring all the vertigo of the room spinning around, and swung out with one arm wildly to summon a blaster.

The low hum of its charging magic quelled his pounding soul, if only a little, and his assailant jumped back at the sight of it. The blast was nigh deafening, but Sans had been in his fair share of fights, so it wasn't hard to simply ignore it.

His second blaster replaced the first one, and its eyes tracked the other — skeleton? — as he ducked to the side to dodge.

"Where's my brother?" he growled out.

"He's— ah!"

The carpet was left singed and smoking after the second blast, and he summoned a sharp bone to follow up. He was already running out of steam, but he was able to pin the other skeleton down laughably easy, and raised the bone up above his head.

"Sans!"

Sans paused, his hand only shaking a little with strain as he held it up. "Pap?" he asked, barely audible.

He'd turned towards the door, towards where the voice had come from. But where he expected his brother, ready to back him up, stood a… different skeleton. He was towering tall, with one hand stuck in the pocket of his garishly orange hoodie and the other held up, kinda like… Sans was…

The hum of... Papyrus'? No, this wasn't Papyrus! blaster replaced Sans', orange energy gathering in its maw. Stunned as Sans was, it was pure adrenaline than made him jump back, out of the angle of the blaster.

And stand there with his chest heaving, because the blaster didn't fire.

Magic lingered in its maw, bright and crackling, but never leaving it. Sans was about to laugh — heh, who taught ya how ta use blasters if ya can't even fire one? — but by the time he'd regained enough breath to even start, the new skeleton had gripped a bone construct in one hand.

Wait, was it…  _ attached _ to the blaster?

Sans didn't have the time to look more closely; the skeleton jumped forwards, dragging the blaster along. With a swing of his arm, the blaster moved in an arc, leaving a glowing trail of magic in its wake. Sans jumped back and raised a wall of bones to protect himself from the next slash.

He didn't expect it to hold, and it didn't. Jumping over the unevenly cut remains of bones, he gripped one and held it with sweaty fingers. 

"Papy! Don't hurt him!" he heard from the right; of course, the other skeleton, small and still on the floor.

Sans wouldn't let himself get distracted.

His soul pounded with exertion. He couldn't last like this.

Poising the bone, he aimed it at one of the blaster's eyes, ready to rip a hole into the construct and hopefully use it to stun the other. 

He must've been more tired than he imagined, because his aim was off and his stab lodged the sharp tip of his bone under the blaster's eye instead of through it.

"Fuck—" he bit out, wide sockets watching as the blaster was raised by the handle.

He squeezed his sockets closed instead of watching further. He stood there, waiting for a blow that didn't come. Tentatively prying one of his eyes open, he was stunned to see Papyrus standing behind the other skeleton, his fingers wrapped around his wrist in a bruising grip to stop him moving the blaster any more.

Papyrus panted, holding a bone up to the other's chin. His eyelights met with Sans'. He mouthed his usual question of 'clear?' and Sans could feel the tingling sensation of being checked.

"Boss," Sans breathed. He could feel the tension draining from him. He nodded. "Clear."

Papyrus nodded, his expression hardening as his gaze slipped off his brother.

"You—" he gasped, pressing the bone against the assailant's cervical vertebrae. "You are under arrest for treason against His Majesty's King Asgore's Royal Guard. If you know what's good for you, you will explain yourself."

He spared a glance towards the other skeleton, still on the floor and looking at them with wide blue eyelights.

"Yourselves."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im in love with the idea of swap pap being well versed in close combat and using a blaster scythe im hhhhhhhh


	3. technical jargon and other nerd ramblings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> *nerd talk*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapters include: mild injury descriptions. let me know if theres anything else that needs to be warned about

Silence stretched between them for what seemed like hours upon hours, but was probably naught but a couple seconds. Papyrus pressed the sharpened bone further against the other's vertebrae, filling the room with the sound of bone scraping against bone.

Shockingly, it was the other skeleton who spoke up, slowly, oh-so-slowly rising back to his feet. As soon as Sans conjured a bone of his own, he held his arms up, palms facing out. "King Asgore… has been gone for a long time."

"Would you like me to add slander to your charges or would you rather I just dust your friend here right away?" Papyrus snarled. Sans could see it took a lot out of him to sound composed; there was sweat beading down the side of his skull, rolling down and disappearing into the grooves of his scars. He didn't comment on it.

"It's the truth!" the small skeleton argued, obviously worried, though he didn't move from his spot. 

Well, at least he had _some_ sense of self-preservation, Sans thought.

"Please… please don't hurt Papy," he continued, "I'm sure this is all a big misunderstanding—! You were outside, buried in the snow, so we took you in to heal you, and…"

"Papy?" Sans echoed, the single word dripping in so much disdain he was surprised he didn't choke on it.

Papyrus made a low noise in the back of his non-existent throat, eyes rowing the other skeleton. The check was so obvious, his eyelights skimming lines of text only he could read.

> Papyrus LV 1 ATK 20 DEF 20
> 
> Brother of the Magnificent Sans. Could go for a smoke right about now.

"Surprised?" the other Papyrus asked, teeth twitching up. The _real_ Papyrus opted to ignore him.

"Sans," he nodded, his grip on the other tightening even further. Sans didn't think it was possible anymore, but at the resulting hiss he was proved wrong. 

So he did what his brother told him and checked the skeleton himself. His browbones furrowed into a frown, and he immediately turned to the other one, who was still babbling nonsense.

> Sans LV 1 ATK 1 DEF 1
> 
> The Magnificent Sans. He will join the Royal Guard one day!

"Oh shit," he mumbled.

Papyrus' glare turned on him, "What do you mean 'oh shit'?" 

"I uh… fuck."

Papyrus wretched his prisoner's arm backwards, almost ripping it out of its magical socket. The blaster scythe clattered to the floor and faded out of existence moments later, and Papyrus shoved the… other Papyrus at the blue-clad Sans. 

"I got it," Sans said, before Papyrus could attempt to raise a bone cage around them, doing it himself. Papyrus' health was still dangerously low, and none of his injuries were gone. He'd been pushing himself in the past couple minutes.

"Splendid," Papyrus said, rolling his eyelights. When they landed back on Sans, he couldn't help but shudder under the intensity of the gaze. "Don't fucking move, you two. I will decide what to do with you shortly. Now, would you be so _kind_ as to explain what the _fuck_ is going on here, Sans?!"

Sans had to look away, suddenly finding the wall to be the most interesting thing he'd ever laid his eyelights on. The posters showcasing various human heroes were old, some of them waterlogged but obviously straightened back out, and all of them were peeling off the wall at the corners.

"So uh…" he started, and immediately ended right there. He had a pretty good idea of what had happened. But putting it into words was going to be a bit of a challenge. Especially knowing Papyrus cared little for science and its specifications.

"Don't have all day."

"Right. So, uh, y'know the machine in our basement?"

Papyrus nodded along, still scowling. "How could I not? I've had to pull you out of there more times than I could count when you forgot about your patrols."

Sans chuckled, a hollow sound. "Heh, yeah, sorry 'bout that. It was uh, the only thing left outta 'Dings' research. We worked on it together b'fore he… Yeah. But uh, I managed to fix it, coupla days ago."

"And? Would you like a medal? Get to the _point_."

"I fucking am! Goddamnit, fuck'n lemme finish before you butt in! I fixed it 'n I was gonna test it, but we got out souls best outta us and y'weren't gonna fuck'n make it! The machine was s'pposed to rewind time, so I took us through so ya wouldn't fuck'n dust!"

Papyrus' expression softened just a little bit, not enough for anyone but Sans to see it. 

"Turns out it didn't rewind time, big whoop dee fuck'n doo. It seems to have taken us to a different goddamn universe!"

"We're right here, y'know," the other Papyrus, hands shoved in his ugly orange hoodie's pocket, piped up from the bone cage.

"Shut up," Papyrus and Sans growled almost simultaneously, heads snapping to glare at him.

It didn't seem to rattle him anywhere near as much as the brothers had wanted. "Jeez, chill."

"Papy, shush," his Sans chided him.

Once again, Sans had to applaud his alternate self for his survival instincts, even if the sickeningly saccharine nickname made him want to hurl.

Papyrus turned back to him. He was looking worse for wear the longer this went on. Sans maneuvered them so Papyrus stood between him and the cage, back faced towards the LV 1 fodder. 

"Not a word," he hissed lowly as he placed a hand under Papyrus' chestpiece, phalanges hovering just shy of touching his soul. The gentle green glow of healing magic lit up the inside of the chestpiece, hidden from anyone else's view.

Tension drained out of Papyrus' shoulders at the feeling of his injuries knitting themselves back together. 

"I c'n get us back," Sans said, louder again, like he'd never stopped his explanation in the first place. He peered over Papyrus' spine to look at the other Papyrus, who seemed to make himself comfortable on the carpet, to the dismay of the other Sans. "If I fixed the machine, this loser prob'ly did too. Well?"

It took hoodie-Papyrus a couple seconds to realize Sans was now talking to him. "Hm? Nah, I gave up on that thing ages ago."

"Great," Papyrus deadpanned.

Through labored breaths, Sans grit out, “Well, d’ya still have it, at least?” He most definitely didn’t like the idea of being stranded in who-the-fuck-knows-where for more than strictly necessary. Which they were well past by now, mind you.

“Sure, it’s in the basement.”

Hand slipping from under his brother’s chestpiece, Sans sighed. Trying to heal after another fight was not the brightest idea he’d had. He’s on a streak of bad ideas lately, it would seem.

“I’ll fix it ‘n get us back, Boss.”

“You had better,” Papyrus conceded. The venom in his voice was purely for show, and Sans knew it. He turned towards the cage and Sans willed it to dissolve. “You. You’re going with Sans.”

The hoodie-Papyrus pointed to himself with a raised browbone, and at Papyrus’ insistent glare stood up, but not without a sigh.

Sans scoffed. “Don’t need ‘im. I can prob’ly fix it faster on m’own.”

“Works for me,” not-Papyrus shrugged, pulling something out of his hoodie’s pocket. Sans was almost tempted to draw another bone, but it turned out to only be a lollipop that the other stuck between his teeth.

“I will not repeat myself,” Papyrus growled, ending that argument. Not that it even had a chance to become an argument in the first place. “I will do recon. You know what to do if he tries to pull anything.”

Sans’ reply was a chortle. “Sure I do. I’mma dust ‘im on the spot,” he said, completely aware of the fact that he couldn’t summon a blaster if he tried at this point. He was tired. But he kept his hand from moving up to his collar out of sheer stubbornness, feeling its magic resonating with Papyrus’. Under his tattered scarf, Papyrus wore a matching one, no doubt feeling the same resonance.

A little pulse of magic going through it would be enough for Papyrus to know if there was trouble. Sans tried not to think of all the times he’d had to use it in the past. Or the times when he felt the sharp tang of bitter energy in turn, scrambling to search for his brother before he’d find nothing but dust. Yeah, definitely not thinking about it.

“Go,” Papyrus commanded them, and Sans turned towards the not-Papyrus, fully intending to grab his arm and drag him to the basement kicking and screaming, if he had to. _Intending to_ being the codewords here. He didn’t make it two steps before the room wobbled around him and he stumbled.

Papyrus’ hand shot out to steady him as the headache pounded in his skull all over again, stronger and more painful than before. His eyelight sputtered out, leaving him in total darkness for a couple seconds.

When he regained himself, it was to find Papyrus in front of him, and the dumb-looking blue Sans behind Papyrus, animatedly throwing his arms around.

“—he’s hurt! I didn’t heal him enough!” the small Sans shouted — or, at least Sans thought he shouted. Each word felt like a stab through his skull.

“Fuck, don’tcha have an indoors voice?” he mumbled, pressing his palm against the crack in his skull, where the pounding was the worst. It didn’t help much.

“Bro, I don’t think it’s a good idea—”

“No, Papy, they’re both hurt! We can’t just stand here!” Small Sans turned from his brother to Papyrus, pleading, “Please, let us heal you! You can’t wander around bleeding!”

Sans snorted through his nasal cavity, meeting not-Papyrus’ eyelights with his own. He could tell what that look meant any day of the week, despite never seeing it before. It was the look he turned on anyone Asgore made him judge.

He held that gaze until not-Papyrus broke it, turning away with a grimace. Good thing, too, because Sans could currently see two of him, and the room was spinning again. He groaned, and the hand that Papyrus had on his shoulder — and that he hadn’t even noticed until now — tightened.

“Don’t try anything,” Papyrus warned, and the blue Sans lit up like a lightbulb, his eyelights turning into blue-tinted stars. Fuck, why did he have six eyes? “-ans? Sans!”

Papyrus shook him, but he couldn’t feel it much past the headache getting even worse. “‘mfine, Paps,” he grunted, feeling anything but. 

It was suddenly so hard to keep his sockets open. So he didn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i swear i can make original chapter endings but i need red to be out of it to have a flashback in the next one so *shrug*


	4. typical tuesday and its typical dumbassery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> red has a nightmare, gets a nickname, and his plans get a wrench in them. typical tuesday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; flashback to the aftermath of an (offscreen) assault  
> let me know if theres anything else that needs to be put here

_ The lab was a mess. _

_ Sans pulled his singed, old lab coat on, fiddling with the buttons as he made his way through the hallways, ignoring the screens that were lighting up as he strode by. None of the lights were on. _

_ “‘Dings?” he called out, peering into one of the rooms. Nope, not in there. He kept going. “‘Dings? Dad?” _

_ There was only one room left, and none of the other ones that he’d peered into had any dust scattered on the floor, so by process of elimination, ‘Dings had to be in this last room, either alive or dusted. _

_ Sans swallowed despite the logistics of not quite being able to. _

_ The door slid open as he walked up to it, revealing a lab room in disarray, papers and beakers littering the floor, one of the tables turned upside down. ‘Dings’ favorite mug was laying on the floor in a sticky puddle of what must’ve once been coffee. _

_ And ‘Dings was… _

_ Well, he was  _ alive,  _ at least. _

_ Sans felt the tension he didn’t even notice falling off his shoulders as the sight of the taller skeleton standing by one of the tables that was still somewhat upright.  _

_ “‘Dings,” he called again, but he still didn’t get a response. His sneakers were too loud as they squeaked across tiles. He hesitated a moment as he got near, hand hovering unsurely in mid-air. _

_ Sans frowned, shaking himself out of it as he tapped ‘Dings on the shoulder. _

_ That definitely broke ‘Dings out of his stupor, his shoulders shooting up as he twisted to look at Sans. _

_ Sans’ browbones furrowed, ‘Dings’ face now visible in the low glow of the numerous screens around them. He had a new crack above his left eye, and the one below his right seemed to go lower than before. It was soaking up the tears that ran down his face in rivulets. _

_ Anger flared within his soul, the need to stride up to the throne room and give the king a piece of his mind, regardless of his own life. And it must’ve shown on his face, because Gaster flinched away from him. _

_ Breathing heavily, Sans schooled his features into a neutral expression. _

_ “‘Dings, it’s fine,” he said as ‘Dings jumped back, whole body trembling as he held the edge of the table. ‘Dings’ eyelights were tiny, unfocused pinpricks in a sea of dark; he couldn’t see Sans. He was probably still seeing Asgore. _

_ Sans sighed, gently lowering his father to the tiled floor. He held ‘Dings’ head to his chest, mindless to the new stains on his lab coat. _

_ They were so close… so close to figuring out how to extract DT from the human souls Asgore had collected so far. Sans looked around the ruined lab; he wondered how much material they’d lost, how far they’d been set back. And where Alphys had gone. _

_ Asgore was losing patience with their research. _

_ He shushed ‘Dings’ sobs, petting his skull through the body-wracking shivers, and let him cry into his shoulder. He didn’t try to find more damage on the older skeleton, instead just tried to heal it. _

_ Idly, he wondered if his father had told him to come in late today because he knew the king would visit. _

* * *

“—’Dings!” he cried out, jolting upright only to slump back down, raising a hand up to his head. Okay, these headaches were getting annoying. His body was shaking too, but he forced the panic deep down into his soul.

Later.

He kept putting it off, and his body (and soul) were starting to tell him he was an idiot. “Fuck’n hell…” he muttered to no one in particular.

“Sans.”

“Fuck, ‘s it time to get up?” he mumbled, groaning into his sleeve, draped over his sockets.

“Don’t freak out.”

Sans snorted, “Oh, that’s a great thing to tell someone, Paps. ‘Don’t freak out,’ like that doesn’t make me  _ wanna  _ freak out.”

He could almost see Papyrus’ disgusted eyeroll. “We could do with less of your snark.”

“Ugh, whassup?” Sans asked as he dropped his hand. And, promptly, freaked out. “Get the fuck offa me!”

The skeleton that had been leaning above him was pulled back, out of range of Sans’ reflexive punch. He groaned again.

“Fuck, ‘m havin’ a deja vu. Either that, or the resets started up again.”

Papyrus was on his left side, and the small skeleton that had been leaning over him was on the right, with not-Papyrus behind him, one arm curled around his brother’s chest. Smart cookie, pulling him away.

Not-Papyrus was pulling his Sans away, talking to him in a hushed whisper, and Papyrus —  _ his _ Papyrus — leaned over with a scowl. “I told you not to freak out.”

“Well, ‘scuse  _ me _ for not appreciatin’ someone’s face in  _ my  _ face bein’ the first thing I see when I wake up,” Sans shot back, sitting up with just a small struggle. He felt better than before he’d, uh… passed out, if he disregarded the panic left in his bones from the dream (memory). The little fake Sans must’ve healed him while he was out.

“Whatever, now that you’re awake, you and… him,” Papyrus grit out, sending a disdainful look towards the hoodie-Papyrus, “can go do whatever the hell you need to do with the machine so we can get back home.”

Sans swung his legs over the edge of his alternate’s blue car-bed. Ugh. “Aye, aye, cap’n.”

Papyrus glared at him half-heartedly, obviously not appreciating Sans’ guard joke. Whatever, one day when he overpowers Undyne and becomes the captain, Sans will get the last laugh. Don’t tell him that.

He didn’t prod it further, knowing all too well the limits of his brother’s patience, and Papyrus seemed to acknowledge his choice with a nod, striding out of the room like a skeleton on a mission.

Didn’t he say he wanted to recon? Or was Sans just imagining things? Whatever, Paps knew how to fend for himself.

“A’ight, orange stain, show me the basement.”

“Stain?” Not-Papyrus echoed with a raised browbone, but he still let his brother go and lead the way outside.

Sans scoffed, “Ain’t no way I’m ever calling ya Papyrus.”

“Thank the stars for that…” Not-Papyrus grumbled under his breath, but his remark was drowned out by Not-Sans’ voice.

The little fucker had a knack for bouncing back, apparently, because his voice was already back to a disgustingly cheery tone. “You’re right, though! We can’t both be Sans, so we should come up with something to call you… like a nickname!”

Sans groaned, eyelights skimming the house as they made their way down the stairs. “My name’s Sans,” he bit out, “Don’t even think ‘bout givin’ me a nickname.” Everything looked like someone had puked a rainbow onto it, too bright and too colorful. His head hurt even looking at it; and here he was, thinking he’d finally be rid of his headache. No, instead he had two of them now, and one wouldn’t shut up.

“But  _ I’m  _ Sans! The one and only magnificent Sans, in fact! So you can have a nickname, that way we won’t get each other mixed up. You can be… hm…” He paused, clearly thinking about it.

Sans groaned again, louder this time.

The biting chill of Snowdin was a welcome change to the oppressive atmosphere of inside, and he welcomed it even if it made his exposed shins prickle with the frost. Orange stain rounded the corner, and there it was, the latched door leading into the basement. Sure, it looked remarkably less held together by nails and wishes, but Sans was seeing a pattern here.

Whatever this place was, the monsters here were wimps — how else would a  _ Papyrus  _ be LV 1 — and that obviously extended to things too. Brighter, non-dilapidated, and… flashing?

Fucking stars, were those goddamned Gyftmas lights strung on the roof?! It’s like they were  _ asking  _ to be ambushed in their own house!

The orange stain stopped dead in his tracks, making no move to open the door and instead leaning on the wall as he fished something out of his pocket. The something turned out to be a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, and he lit one of them, replacing the chewed-up lollipop stick.

“Papy!” Not-Sans scolded, crossing his arms on his chest, but Not-Papyrus only shrugged in response, taking a long drag and exhaling it into a puff of smoke.

Sans shook his head and, deciding they were both useless, set to opening the hatch himself, yanking the wooden door upwards. It was much easier without the weight of his brother draped across his shoulder, admittedly.

“I got it! Red!”

Sans swore, rather colorfully, when the exclamation startled him and the door slipped from his grasp and fell right on top of his fingers. “What the fuck?” he demanded, turning towards the small skeleton.

“Red!” he repeated, way too chipper for Sans’ taste. His fingers stung like hell.

Sans rolled his eyelights. “Yeah, I heard ya b’fore. Just didn’t know we had a safeword yet.”

Not-Papyrus shot him a glare, but whatever he was about to bark out didn’t make it out, because not-Sans finally,  _ finally  _ explained himself. “What? No, I mean your nickname! Red!”

“What.”

“R-e-d! Red, I think it suits you!”

The orange stain chuckled, and Sans forced down the urge to strangle him. Instead, he looked down at himself; his jacket was still tattered, but his sneakers and shorts weren’t waterlogged anymore, which was a plus, he guessed. “Wow, super original. I wonder where ya got that, blueberry.”

Now, that was worth it if only to see the little fucker’s face flare up with so much blue his skull really did start looking like a blueberry, and not-Papyrus’ expression was conveying… something. Whatever the two dumb brothers were thinking, Sans didn’t care, and he threw the basement latch open again, descending the stairs two at a time. Yep, definitely easier without a limp body to be careful about.

“You know, I think blueberry is kinda cute! But the magnificent Sans is not cute, so you’ll have to try again!”

Sans opted to ignore him.

“Soooo… you’re okay with me calling you Red then, right?”

Which was proving to be an ordeal and a half with him breathing down his neck. You know, metaphorically, since the shrimp didn’t reach that high. Maybe if he stood on his tiptoes.

And then jumped.

“Whatever, _blueberry_. I ain’t staying here long ‘nough fer ya to use it, anyways.”

“Then it’s settled! Now we just need a nickname for your brother!”

Sans — Red? Is he really going with the shrimp’s idea? — cringed inwardly. “If y’wanna get dusted, be my guest. At least it’ll be funny. Anyways, where’s the machine?”

The basement itself looked pretty much the same as, well, theirs, except the desk was coated in a thick layer of dust — it was probably just normal, everyday dust, not  _ real _ , monster dust — and the floor lacked it, contrary to what Red was used to. 

“Over there, in the back,” Orange Stain said, taking the initiative to walk up to it and pull the old cloth from over it. Okay, it looked just like his, with the odd wire here and there, and the panel was on the other side, but other than that, he shouldn’t have any trouble fixing it up.

Red grabbed a tack of blueprints from off the table and looked them over. 

And just as quickly, his soul dropped to the bottom of his ribcage.

“What,” he muttered, flipping over to the next paper, and then the next, and the next, “ _ pray fuck’n tell _ is this shit?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoa there red, youre skipping at least 6 chapters in the dating manual! anyway.


	5. red's very bad, no good, terrible experience with snowdin forest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> red's day keeps getting better and better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; panic attack(s), violence, vomiting, (mild) self harm  
> please let me know if theres anything else that warrants a warning

“Wowza, you should really work on that language!”

Red could feel his eyesocket twitching, but as he looked over the blueprints again, the same chicken scrawl looked back at him, the same calculations, the same diagrams. And none of them made a lick of sense to him. “What, pray fuck’n tell, is this crap?!” 

Blue winced, “That’s not quite what I meant. We can work on it later.”

The Orange Stain walked over to Red to peer over his shoulder at the blueprints, much to his annoyance, but not before placing a hand onto his brother’s head and giving it a small pat — ugh, gross. “What’re you so stumped about?”

Oh stars, these idiots were really testing his patience. However, he was able to keep his need for violence to a minimum. As in, just a loud growl.

“This ain’t ‘Dings’ work! He’d never tolerate this jumbled mess of shit! It doesn’t even make sense!”

The Stain — for short, because even in Red’s head,“The Orange Stain” was too long — frowned, and then raised a browbone, and  _ then  _ took out another lollipop from his pocket and stuck it between his teeth. “Duh,” he muttered around the stick, “That’d be because Gaster didn’t work on it?”

“What d’you mean ‘Dings didn’t work on it?!” 

Red shook with an emotion he couldn’t name, and his LV was stirring up inside his soul like a vicious molotov cocktail. 

“Gaster drives the boat down the river,” Blue supplied, (not so) helpfully, “I don’t know anything about him being a scientist.”

“Dr-dri _ ves _ ?” Red repeated, just to make sure he hadn’t misheard. “He’s… alive?”

“Of course! He drove me back here yesterday, after my training!”

The blueprints trembled in Red’s too-tight grip. He could feel his soul beating loud and fast in his chest. He needed— he— 

The papers fluttered to the ground in a scattered mess as he teleported, leaving the two brothers alone in the basement with just a soft wind gust.

“I don’t think he likes Gaster,” Sans commented, watching the papers land on the tiles.

Papyrus bit into his lollipop, its crack too loud. “Nah, I don’t think that’s it, bro. But, since we have the time now… make sure to be careful around them, okay?”

“You think they’d start another fight?”

Papyrus sighed. He needed something to occupy his hands, so he leaned down and started picking the blueprints back up. Back onto the table they went. “I’m not gonna lie to you, Sans. You’ve seen their LV.”

Sans hummed, seemingly deep in thought. “Well, I think it’ll be fine! There’s no reason for a fight here, not like any human has come here in a long time! And even if they did,  _ I _ would be the one to capture them!”

Papyrus didn’t have the soul to tell him you didn’t need a reason to fight if your LV was high enough.

* * *

Red found himself deep in the Snowdin forest, the trees surrounding him simultaneously suffocating and providing the cover he so desperately craved. 

He didn’t know why he teleported here in the first place, but, just to get himself under control again, he sent a handful of bones into one of the trees, their jagged edges lodging themselves deep into the trunk. When that didn’t help, he summoned a blaster and split the tree clean down the middle.

He watched as it fell, taking another one with it on the way, and when  _ that  _ didn’t help him feel any better, he just slumped against another tree, gripping handfuls of the bark and chipping it off.

He couldn’t get his breathing under control, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how far away he tried shoving his bubbling emotions. His headache pounded behind his sockets again, and his soul refused to stop its little performance of a bird crying to escape its dumb little cage. 

He slid down the tree gradually, not even realizing it until he was sitting on the coat of fresh snow. He also realized he wasn’t holding onto the tree anymore, but there were fistfuls of its bark gripped between his phalanges, tiny little splinters that dug into his bones. Not that he could feel the pain; he stared blankly at his hands, as if the little, broken pieces of a tree held the secrets of this universe, of getting back home.

Stars, he’d really fucked up.

Not only was it his fault that they lost the battle against the bunnies — fuckin’ bunnies! who ever fuckin’ lost to the bunnies! —, it was also his fault they ended up in another goddamn universe, he couldn’t program a fucking coordinate into a dumb console, and he couldn’t even repair another machine to get them back! He was a fucking disgrace, a useless pile of bones, and when Papyrus learned he couldn’t get them back, he’d probably dust him on the spot, and he’d fucking deserve it—

At some point during his mental monologue, his headache got worse and the forest blurred before him, and only when he raised a hand up to his face, and then just as quick tore it away, hissing at the feeling of bark he’d already forgotten he was still holding scraping against his cheek, did he realize he was crying. Red magic clung to his scratched up fingertips, and he gagged at the sight.

It looked just like marrow, thick and viscous, and covering Paps’ body—

He turned his head to the side just fast enough to both give himself motion sickness and expel his magic into the snow instead of his own lap. There wasn’t much, and his non-existent stomach made it abundantly clear it did not appreciate his little stunt, hunger gnawing at his bones. 

When was the last time he ate?

The last thing he could remember eating was his brother’s lasagna; or, more accurately, a pathetic excuse for it, since all they had left in the pantry at that point had been the pasta and the last can of minced meat. Papyrus refused to even call it lasagna, too proud of his culinary skills to put his name on such an atrocity, but Red had still eaten it, because even with two ingredients and some water, his brother was able to make a dish he would’ve asked for seconds of, even if he hadn’t. Why would he waste food when he had had his fill and his HP had been maxed out? No, he couldn’t do that to his brother, what if…

Well, he supposed the worst case scenario had happened anyways.

Thinking about it, the leftovers were probably still in their fridge, but he didn’t even think of that when he’d dragged Papyrus out of the fight.

Stars, was there no end to his list of fuck-ups?

He pointedly turned away from the pile of magic vomit, definitely not needing yet  _ another  _ reminder of bone marrow splattered on snow, and got on his feet, shaky as they were. The tree paid again for his attempt, claws ripping another chunk of bark off its surface before he felt stable enough to stand without the support.

And he’d wanted Papyrus to be there when he broke down, what a joke. It was so funny, in fact, that he chuckled, throat protesting and voice raw, scratched by the magic he’d expelled moments ago. He kept laughing until he was out of breath, still feeling the tears running down his cheeks, and he could taste them where they slipped into his mouth.

It was… a good thing he was alone.

If anyone saw him in this state, they wouldn’t hesitate to attack him, and he probably couldn’t put up much of a fight. It was pathetic, and he  _ felt _ pathetic. He couldn’t even stand upright without his knees wobbling, for fuck’s sake!

He wiped at his eyes furiously, adding more stains to his already ruined jacket, but when the choked-up feeling in his whole body was replaced by nothing at all, only then did he stop. He looked around, checking the perimeter. And mentally kicking himself for not doing that in the first place, did he not learn  _ anything _ in the years he’d lived in the Underground?!

He was pretty far into the forest, and it looked pretty much the same as he’d been used to, sans (heh) a lot of the singed and fallen trees. The path wound itself a little ways away, and he could just barely make out a little bit of the Ruins’ wall between the trunks.

Maybe… maybe a couple dead kids jokes with Tori would lift his mood. Not like she’d see him anyways, so it didn’t matter that his face was probably (definitely) a disgraceful mess.

The empty feeling didn’t leave him as he trudged through the snow, probably getting his sneakers waterlogged again, so, giving his surroundings another wary once-over, he reached under his shirt and pulled his soul out, looking it over. Nope, it was still a dim mess of scars and hairline fractures. As he turned it around, he could spot a couple new ones on the underside of it, criss-crossing the left half like a spiderweb.

Not quite satisfied, but assured it wasn’t about to just break into two, he shoved it back under his shirt unceremoniously, eyelights scanning his surroundings. He just hoped no one had seen him.

The Ruins door came into view surprisingly soon, and it was the same he was used to, tall and imposing and most definitely locked. For some reason, it made him feel a little better, like he wasn’t in a universe where he didn’t know the rules, even though he was. Playing pretend had always been his favorite pastime, after all.

He raised a hand and banged on the door, hard enough for a couple little pieces of rubble to come loose and shower the snow around him. “Knock knock.”

He couldn’t say he expected Tori to be right by the door right when he decided to stop his little breakdown, but he was surprised he did get a response. Except the voice was not Toriel’s. It was…

“Haha, I thought we were past the knock knock jokes, Papyrus! Very well, who’s there?”

Red swallowed. 

This was… Asgore.

“Figs,” he finally choked out, after what felt like a whole lifetime.

“Figs who?”

“Figs the doorbell, it’s still not working.”

Asgore, from the other side of the door, let out a deep sigh, but it was followed by a quiet chuckle. “That was awful,” he said. The breath Red was finally able to regain was lost again. What was he doing, telling shitty jokes to the King?! He’d get thrown into the cells, or… or… “Say, you sound different today, did something happen?”

Red’s hand found its way under his sleeve and his claws scratched at his radius, like the burning sensation could ground him again. “Oh, y’know… I was supposed to catch a human, but all I caught was a cold.”

“Are you sure? You know you can always talk to me, Papyrus.”

Nothing could’ve prepared him for this, and he had already decided it was a mistake to come here five minutes ago. “Yeah, it’s fine. I just… wanted to check up on you.”

Asgore laughed, the sound unnatural, rattling Red’s bones. “That’s nice of you. You should go home and heal up, though. Colds can get nasty. Oh, I would give you tea if I…”

“It’s okay!” Red blurted, unable to take any more of this. “I’ll go sleep it off, it’s what I’m best at, after all.”

He’d always considered himself a good actor, but he’d never tried to directly lie to the King, or… hide his accent. He didn’t wait to see if it had been bought or not, turning on his heel and marching back down the path while trying to calm his soul, which was now pretending it was a freshly caught fish trying to yank itself off the hook.

He was already halfway to Snowdin when he remembered he could teleport, so he did. He could look into the machine. He  _ would  _ look into the machine. He’d fix it and he’d get them back home, and then he wouldn’t need to fucking teleport to have a little breakdown and find the fucking King, of all people, hidden inside the Ruins where he’d expect his… friend? No, more like, joke buddy.

Alright, dumb machine, here he came!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wowza, red, thats a nice mental breakdown you got there, how many of em can you have in a row?


	6. taco tuesday with some strong intent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> red tries his hand at the machine and papy does his work as a 'sentry', for once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no warnings for this chapter as far as i know. do let me know if there is something you think warrants one, though!

Blue did not stress cook. 

No siree, he did not prepare platters and platters of tacos when his brother stayed out late at Muffet’s, he did not bake cupcakes (chocolate, with honey-cream filling, because they were Papy’s favorite) when he was worried about his inability to join the Guard, and he most certainly did not cook up another batch of taco meat right now, with tortilla shells already prepared to go along with it.

“Damn, that’s a lot of meat,” Papy said as he entered the kitchen, on his way to grab one of the aforementioned cupcakes from the fridge. He preferred them cold, and while Blue found it weird and teeth-aching, he’d never had the soul to tell his brother to stop something he clearly enjoyed and hurt no one with. 

“Language!” Blue huffed, though he didn’t defend himself. Papy knew him best, after all, so there would be no point.

“Haha, whoops. Guess the new guests are a bad influence.”

“You can’t really blame anyone when you swear every day, Papy.”

Papy shrugged, making off with his cupcake prize. He didn’t leave like Blue expected, though, just sat himself at the kitchen table and bit into the treat. Blue didn’t know what to do now that his brother was watching him, and the dinner was already done.

“So, Papy, have they returned yet?” Blue asked, feeling a little silly for it, since neither of their new guests were _present_ , but he wasn’t dumb. He knew Papy had gone out to keep an eyesocket on them.

“Oh yeah, Red you went back into the basement a while ago,” he said, with a mouthful of icing, which just made Blue cringe.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full, that’s not polite.”

Papy shrugged, chewed what he had in his mouth, swallowed, and then continued, all under his brother’s ireful glare. Sure, he’d been getting it every day for years now, but it still got to him. “Edgy me went into town. Last I saw him, he was just... Staring at Muffet’s, looking like a lost puppy.”

Blue had taken the initiative to move the tortillas and meat onto the table. “Are you sure it wasn’t just you wanting to go for another bottle of honey?”

Papy chuckled, snagging one of the tortillas to fill up. “Nah. I didn’t even go in, promise, bro.”

“Alright then. It’s not like I can stop you anyways, you’re an adult.” Blue thought for a second, watching as Papy raised the tortilla shell up to his teeth — and then cringing as he imagined the wonderful meat mixing with the aftertaste of a cupcake. “I’m gonna go grab Red, he must be starving by now!”

“Be careful,” Papy called after him.

He wasn’t _that_ worried; nothing… bad had happened, even with the two killers on the loose. Edgy him had wandered the town, stopping here and there as if he had to think about what he was seeing, and though Papyrus couldn’t say he could sympathize, he _could_ try imagining himself in the other’s shoes, and he’d probably do the same. Sans’ red version had eluded him for a bit, since he’d teleported, but Papyrus had found him in the forest eventually, loitering around the Ruins door and talking to Asgore. He hadn’t lingered to listen, only interested in making sure everyone was alive and well — okay, the ‘well’ part had been debatable, but he was not about to tell his brother that his alternate version had apparently bawled his eyes out in the forest — before he’d returned home.

Sans huffed at him with an eyelight roll as he pulled his boots on.

He’d better hurry up with bringing Red here, or they’d have no tacos left.

* * *

Red had a headache.

Sure, the time he didn’t have a headache could be compared to the time he’d been safe in his whole life, but that was unimportant. At least this time he had a reason for it and it wasn’t just a random bout of a migraine coming to haunt another one of his days. 

He’d been staring at the blueprints for… uh… huh. Time existed, and flowed around him, but he didn’t really know what time it was now, since there were no windows in the basement. No matter what it was, he wasn’t done yet, so it didn’t really matter either.

He’d been staring at the blueprints, trying his hardest to decipher the messy scribbles and rewriting them onto clear sheets of paper left in the drawers so he wouldn’t have to re-decipher them every couple minutes when he inevitably forgot what they said. Not that that had happened. Well, maybe once or twice. Irrelevant again.

He’d sketched a new series of blueprints, some of them a recreation of what he remembered of his own machine, some of them redone blueprints he’d been studying, with little changes here and there when the originals were too stupid and used inefficient parts, and some completely new, an amalgam of both, because he was starting to have a feeling he’d have to take the whole thing apart and put it back together.

He kept muttering ‘what the fuck’ under his breath, and the only consolation was the fact that the intervals between his angry (definitely not frustrated) outbursts were getting longer the longer he worked.

Trying his damndest to make out what one of the notes in the margins of a paper said, he didn’t notice the door being pulled open behind him, nor the footsteps coming down the stairs.

“Hey Red!”

He jumped off the ground, almost tearing the paper in half as he summoned a bone construct to grip, twisting on his heel and dropping into a defensive position.

“Whoa, it’s okay! It’s just me, the magnificent Sans!”

Red’s eyeflare died down as his mind placed the person before him, bone fizzing out from between his fingers. “Don’t sneak up on me if ya value yer life,” he grit out.

“Aw, c’mon, you wouldn’t kill yourself, would you?” Red grimaced at that, browbones drawing together, but said nothing. Blue hurried to continue, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Anyways! I made tacos for dinner, would you like some?”

The simple mention of food had Red’s long-ignored faux stomach twisting over itself, but he glanced warily between the small skeleton and the blueprints scattered in messy, but still understandable little piles.

Sure, maybe looking at this skeleton, dressed up like a seven-year-old made his outfit, didn’t make him think he’d be up for the _usual_ ways of exchanging extra food, but he’d been around for long enough not to fall for an obvious trap.

“What’s the catch, shrimp?”

Blue paused, his unconscious rocking dying down. He tilted his head to the side. “Catch?”

“What’s your price?”

“Uh… What?”

Red groaned. Stupid fucking alternate him. He’d been doing just fine ignoring his hunger when he’d been preoccupied with the blueprints and their absolutely abhorrent chicken scrawls, but now that he’d been reminded, it was very hard to keep ignoring.

“There’s... no catch? So come on, before they get cold!”

Blue stepped up to him, reaching out, and it was second nature for Red to step back, placing himself near the corner so he’d have a clear view of Blue _and_ the exit. “Fuck’re ya doin’?”

“You don’t really like touching, do you? I was gonna hold your hand!”

“The fuck would ya do that fer?”

“Language,” Blue huffed, “You’re worse than Papy.”

The gross nickname for Blue’s brother still made him want to gag, and Blue’s sincere expression was not helping a bit. If he even _thought_ about calling Papyrus that, he’d have a bone up to his chin, and a fight on his hands. Thinking about it, that didn’t sound too bad right now.

Blue must’ve taken his moment of silence as acquiescence to… something or another, because he turned around and motioned with a hand for Red to follow. Red’s mind drew a comparison to a dog, and he bristled. “Come on!”

On one hand, he wasn’t about to let this little ball of dumb decisions command him, but on the other one… he was hungry.

He conceded with a mental slap to himself, mind running ninety in a sixty coming up with the worst scenarios of what Blue would want in return for the meal. The whole time, Blue just would not shut up about the food, spewing line after line about how “You’ll love them!”, “They’re my special recipe!”, or “They’re as magnificent as me. Well, almost!”

Blue’s laugh was ear canal grating, and Red had to concentrate to push back the headache still pulsing behind his sockets. He was almost glad when they were back inside the house, and then he actually felt better, if only marginally, when he spotted Paps sitting at the table, arms folded as he glared at his alternate self.

Watching the two of them, Red could not find a single similarity, past the general looks. The Stain was even lazier than him, at least from what he’d seen so far, and that was saying something.

“Sans,” Papyrus spoke up, raising his eyelights to rake over Red and Blue, and Red could feel the slight tingle of a check. He wondered what his flavor text said. “Clear?”

“Clear,” he nodded, although with a sigh.

“You two talk in a code, don’t you? Papy, we should also make a secret code!” Blue said, earning himself a chuckle from his brother, and twin glares as well.

“Sure, bro, if you want.”

Blue made a thoughtful noise as he went to the table, placing tortilla shells onto the plates that were stacked in the middle — “Thank you, Papy!” — and filled them with meat. The last thing was a sprinkle of shredded cheese on top, and then he placed the three plates around the table. “What if I call you Orange, and you can call me Blue, it’ll be like secret spy names.”

“S’not really secret if yer just talking about it in front of people,” Red pointed out, flopping onto the last empty chair. 

“Aw, shoot! You’re right! We’ll come up with something later, okay, Papy?”

“Works for me.” The Stain grabbed another tortilla and filled it up himself, plopping it onto his already-dirty plate.

“Alright, dig in! I’m sure you’ll love the magnificent Sans’ cooking! Mweh heh!”

Red stared down at his plate, his conjured tongue running over the backs of his teeth, but he looked at his brother and waited until he took a bite of his own. Papyrus grimaced at the first taste, but he placed the bitten taco back onto the plate and switched their plates. He nodded at Sans, who had no further qualms about digging in.

“It’s not poisoned, you know,” the Stain said, quirking a browbone at them. Red shrugged.

“I did not see him make it,” Papyrus said, and his tone left no room for objections.

“Stars, you two are weird.”

“Papy, that’s rude.”

Watching the two of them, Red was stunned to see a _couple_ of similarities; that looked awfully like one of his and Papyrus’ little squabbles, just with less growling and exactly zero attacks flying at the wall. He raised the taco to his teeth and took a bite, and almost spat it right back up.

The intent hit him at full force, happiness and excitement and the _want to heal_ that were so strong they made him choke. Papyrus shot him an understanding look. Stars, how did he manage to keep his response down to a _grimace_? Blue, on the other hand, was looking worried.

“Oh no, do you not like it?”

Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, Red reminded himself. The connotations to that saying have been a little fucked in his head, but it worked. “Nah, s’good,” he said finally, and his voice didn’t break.

There was no fucking way he’d ever say it out loud, but the taco tasted like _Papyrus_ had made it, for him.

“Oh, I’m glad! You can eat as many as you want!”

No, thanks. Red ate the one, and while he could’ve gone for another, or even two, he stopped himself. He still didn’t know the price, and he didn’t want to owe any more to the shrimp than absolutely necessary. And even if he did have any more, he wasn’t sure he could stand the intent. Sure, it _felt_ like Papyrus’, but just like when he’d awoken to find Blue checking him, it was not the _same_.

Papyrus looked like he wanted to talk to him, probably ask about the machine and when it’d be fixed, but he didn’t. Red felt the same.

“Bro,” the Stain piped up, “We should figure out sleeping arrangements.”

Blue perked up immediately. Wait, what. “You’re right! Your room is out of the question, it looks like the dump itself.” Papyrus snorted, throwing Red a look. Red threw back a middle finger, to Paps’ amusement. “You guys can take my room for the night, I’ll take the couch!”

Wait, _what_.

“Works for me. I can grab you a pair of pajamas, edgy me.”

“I should grab Red one as well!”

**_What._ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> at this point im just throwing headcanons onto a google doc and hoping for the best


	7. the stars shine brighter at night, unsurprisingly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> edge has a soul to soul with 2/3 of the new 'household'.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; mentions and thoughts of killing and vague references to being forced to kill. let me know if theres anything else that warrants a warning

Red had absolutely no idea how he got to where he was right now; standing in his alternate self’s bedroom, wearing his pajamas (a ‘loose’ shirt and oversized, gaudy blue pants, which might’ve been loose and comfy on the other skeleton, but were very much very tight around his bigger bones), and staring at his brother, who didn’t seem much more comfortable with his own getup.

Papyrus had his skull pressed against the wood of the door, listening to see if they were safe to talk. Blue’s conversation with his brother was loud enough to be heard from downstairs, so he highly doubted they could hear them unless they  _ wanted _ to be heard, but he didn’t stop Papyrus’ precautions.

“Alright,” Papyrus said finally, apparently satisfied by The Stain’s footsteps receding into the other room down the hallway. “Give me a report, Sans.”

Red grit his teeth, yet again finding the posters plastered on the walls uncannily interesting. “Well, the machine is… I sorted the blueprints and I got started on the wirin’.” He hoped against hope that Papyrus wouldn’t ask more than that, because even lying to this extent was making his soul pound in his ribcage and hands feel sweaty.

“Will you be able to fix it?”

This time, Red didn't hesitate. “Yeah.” He didn’t think he was lying; he’d try his damndest to fix his own mess and get them back, no matter what.

Papyrus seemed satisfied with that. “Alright.”

Red didn’t know why that made him feel better, it was just his brother acknowledging his response, but he was so glad Papyrus didn’t seem mad at him. He had all rights to; after all, it was Red’s, and Red’s only, fault. It was him who just used the machine without testing it, putting them in the potential danger of just dusting, got them stranded in a whole new universe, him who wasted half the day having a goddamn breakdown instead of working on the one solution they had to the whole situation.

“Underground to Sans!”

A snap before his eye sockets snapped (heh) him out of his thoughts, and Red blinked a couple times until Papyrus’ face came into focus. “Wh-what?”

His brother seemed to study him for an almost uncomfortable amount of time, and then he frowned. “Clear?” he asked.

“Clear,” Red replied instantly, eyelights shifting left and right just to double check if they were indeed safe.

Papyrus’ frown deepened. “No. Are  _ you _ clear?”

“I…Yeah,” Red swallowed heavily, and then thought about the answer he gave instinctually again. Was he…  _ was _ he clear? “...no?” It sounded more like a question than an answer, and was more pathetic than any of his previous lies.

Papyrus nodded and sat on Blue’s space-rocket bed, patting the covers as an invitation for Red. Reluctantly, Red sat next to him, his anxiety returning tenfold.

They sat in silence, the atmosphere getting heavier and heavier by the second, until Papyrus placed a hand onto his back. Red jumped, but when Papyrus didn't move his hand, he slowly relaxed again.

“So, do you want to tell me, or should I force you to?”

Red knew Papyrus would. He (almost) always beat (almost) anything he tried to hide out of him. It was usually for the best.

“Aren’t you pissed?” he asked finally, feeling the weight of his soul falling further down his chest cavity.

“Should I be?”

“Uh...yeah? I got us fuck’n… lost in a different universe!” And many, many other things, but his non-throat seized up and he didn’t even try to say any of them.

Papyrus watched him, until Red couldn't stand it and turned away. Wow, those superhero posters sure were interesting! Yeah. Yeah...

“Let me give you my report.”

Red looked back. Papyrus was no longer looking straight at — through — him, and instead was watching the door. “Huh?”

“Every single monster I met today, I checked. And not a single one of them had any EXP. They were all just out and about, and didn’t give me a second glance. It was… unnerving. I could’ve dusted them all with just a couple of bones.”

“What’re ya talking about, Paps?”

“I don’t think any of them here could put up a fight,” Papyrus continued, seemingly ignoring Red, even though they both knew he wasn’t. “And Undyne  _ is  _ the Captain of the Royal Guard. She can handle the Underground,  _ our _ Underground, on her own for a while.”

Red raised a hand to his chest, gripped onto the borrowed shirt. Papyrus leaned closed, almost unnoticeably so, and immediately, Red leaned in as well, resting the side of his skull against Papyrus’.

The silence felt less oppressive now, and Red didn’t want to move. The contact was comforting, despite being so simple. It was what they allowed themselves. Love and attachment was dangerous; there was never telling when someone was watching, and who would pass up the opportunity to kidnap and use the Great and Terrible Papyrus’, Lieutenant of the Royal Guard’s, brother? Some of the monsters had learned their lesson, back when they  _ had  _ kidnapped Red, or tried to, and he ended up with a new batch of EXP and one higher of an LV. He had to let Papyrus deal the killing blows for a whole month to even them out again.

Man, that had been fun.

“Thanks, bro,” Red mumbled, leaning away just a bit so he could clink their skulls together again.

Papyrus laughed, airily, and pushed Red away. “Get some sleep.”

“What about you?”

“I will keep watch.”

“Well… wake me up inna couple hours, then. We can swap.”

Papyrus threw a blanket at him. “I will think about it.”

* * *

Papyrus did not, in fact, wake him up. The temptation of sleep was there, sure, but it’s not like he needed it. Not like Sans.

His stupid, stupid brother, thinking he could hide anything from him. Like his apparent fear, or the fact that he seemed marginally better than when Papyrus had left to do recon, hinting at the machine not having been Sans’ very first priority today. That was fine, though.

Papyrus was not  _ good  _ at all that comforting and consoling shit, but he’d be damned if he didn’t try for his brother. Plus, stating facts was more effective and faster than anything he could come up with.

He went downstairs when he was sure his brother had fallen asleep, and had thrown another blanket onto him just for good measure. Instead of finding his brother’s blue-clad version — and honestly! How could anyone expect him to believe those two were the same person? Blue was pathetic, reckless and all-too-energetic. Nothing like his brother! — he found his own pathetic doppelganger, draped across the couch in a position that looked nowhere near comfortable.

“Didn’t… Blue… say he was taking the couch?” Papyrus asked, tripping over the name. Firstly, it felt weird to call someone a color, and secondly, he wasn’t used to taking orders from anyone who wasn’t Undyne (and Sans. On occasions. Like battles).

Loser Papyrus lifted his head, opening one of his eye sockets and promptly chuckling at the sight of Papyrus wearing his clothes. “Oh, hey, edgy me. Sent him to my room so he can sleep on a real mattress.”

Papyrus scowled.

“I cleaned it,” loser Papyrus — and okay, this was getting old. He was over calling this lazy pile of bones himself! — shrugged, stretching not unlike a cat and standing up. “How about grabbing a smoke with me?”

“I don’t smoke, Stretch.” Sure, that could work.

The newly-dubbed Stretch raised a proverbial brow. “Stretch, really?”

“I am not calling you Papyrus. And if you don’t shut up, I will find a stretching rack and show you the true meaning of the name.”

Stretch, to his credit, just laughed. “Sure, whatever floats your bones, Edge-y. Now c’mon, Snowdin is pretty in the dark.”

And thus, they found themselves on the porch, Stretch digging his pocket for his smokes and lighting one with a… very tiny blaster. Edge wasn’t above agreeing that was kind of cool, if only in his own head. The smoke curled up through the air, spreading until it was indistinguishable from the fake clouds slowly rolling above them.

“Y’sure you don’t want one?” Stretch asked, holding the pack out.

“I already said no. That’s more my brother’s thing.”

Stretch put them back into the pocket with a shrug, and a quiet, “Suit yourself.”

“You followed me today.” Was it supposed to be a question? It didn’t come out as one, but Edge was too prideful to take it back.

“I did,” Stretch nodded, “Just wanted to make sure there wouldn’t be a massacre, you know.”

Edge thought back to all the LV 1 monsters, how easy it would’ve been. Free EXP, just walking around everywhere. But he had standards, and right now, no orders.

The silence enveloped them, only punctuated by Stretch’s slow drags and puffs, and the rustling of the treetops from afar. Still, Edge kept his eyelights peered, scanning around for any potential threats. You didn’t want to be out on your own after dark. And sure, he wasn’t  _ technically  _ alone, and sure, maybe Stretch could use that blaster-scythe of his, but he was only able to overpower his brother because he was tired and weak. That was no reason to let his guard down.

Stretch seemed to share exactly zero of his worries. He leaned on the railing and looked up, oblivious to the world around them.

After making sure there was no one around, save that one bunny monster shambling out of Muffet’s and limping their way down the other side of the road, and then re-checking twice, Edge allowed himself to look up as well, to see what his alternate found so fascinating.

Fake stars speckled the ceiling of the cavern, peeking from the clouds, shimmering in and out. They looked different than the ones he was used to; brighter, and was there more of them?

“Did you know, there are a trillion stars in the Milky Way Galaxy. Most of them travel the sky with companions, but our Sun moves around alone. Must be lonely.”

Edge grunted quietly, letting the other know he heard. Sometimes Sans — Red — regaled him with science facts, but it was always when he needed to take his mind off of something and Edge just let it in one ear canal and out the other. There was usually marrow included in the scene.

Like the last time he’d sparred with his brother. He’d been summoned to the King’s castle as the Judge, and spent the entire day there. When he came back, he was jittery from an LV rush, and kept stammering out facts about thermodynamic reactors between clashes of bone constructs. Edge had never claimed to understand any of it, but he’d been able to keep up with his brother’s scattered thoughts with a few well-placed comments he’d remembered from a similar situation long ago.

Edge had never been a fan of his brother’s job as the Judge, not that he’d ever say it to Red, or, stars forbid, the King. He’d had the misfortune of ending up on the other side of the Judgement Hall once, and the sight of his brother standing there with crimson magic overtaking his eyelights was one he didn’t think he’d ever get to stop plaguing his nightmares.

“—and it’s about three hundred thousand kilometers a second.” Oh, Stretch was still talking.

“You know, this is like listening to my brother,” Edge muttered. Stretch finally tore his eyelights off the ceiling and looked at him. His cigarette was nothing but a butt now and he flicked it into a small jar next to the steps with the precision of someone who had done so a million times. He regarded Edge with a thoughtful look, even as he fumbled his pocket again and replaced the cigarette with another lollipop.

“Think we got off on the wrong foot,” he said. As he almost sat on the railing, phalanges curling around the metal bars, Edge couldn’t look past how utterly unguarded the skeleton was. He could summon a bone, jab it into his soul right there and then. He wouldn’t have enough time to block or jump out of the way. The lazy grin on his face was lopsided. “How about we start over? Hi, I’m Papyrus, but you can call me Stretch.”

It caught Edge off his own guard, and he stared at the hand that was extended to him longer than was probably courteous. “I’m Papyrus,” he forced out, finally. When he took the offered hand, the other’s grip was slack. “You can call me Edge, I suppose. I’m from a different… dimension? Universe?”

Stretch laughed, moving the hand back into his pocket. Thank the stars for that, that had been getting weird. “Nice to meet’cha. I think you’ll like my brother. His name’s Sans, but you can call him Blue. He’s the coolest sentry in the Underground.”

“I bet my brother’s cooler. He’s the  _ Chief  _ sentry,” Edge couldn’t help but challenge. Stretch grinned, a glint in his eyelight as he did so.

“Can your brother cook the best tacos ever?”

Tacos? No, he didn’t even know what those were until today. But Edge couldn’t help remembering another aftermath of a battle, Red holding him in the kitchen chair with nothing but his blue magic while he cooked up a box of whatever pasta they had leftover. Edge couldn’t remember what it had been, but he  _ could _ remember being forced to eat it, each bite full of intent so scalding it felt like his soul would overflow with it.

“He makes pasta almost as good as I do.”

Nothing seemed to get to Stretch, not the long stretches (oh, Red would’ve had a field day with that one) of silence, nor Edge’s curt replies. “I look forward to trying it someday.”

There were a couple things that occurred to Edge at that moment. He didn’t know how long they’d be stuck here, with… Stretch and Blue. He didn’t know anyone else in this universe, and his title of the Lieutenant meant nothing here. But most importantly, Red would stay on edge (oh stars, he was turning into his brother at this rate!) as long as Edge acted like there was something wrong.

He’d have to make sure his observations were correct so far. Learn as much as he could. It was up to him to make sure Red didn’t feel the need to lie to him again, especially about something as important as a clear check. Stupid, stupid brother that Edge would lay his own life down for.

“I suppose that  _ could _ be arranged.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> edge being supportive is just *chefs kiss* even though im probably overdoing it. w/e


	8. red asks to get his non-existent ass kicked

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> and red GETS his non-existent ass kicked

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; mentioned past murder, violence and fighting without any actual injury. let me know anything else needed to be warned about

For once in his life, Red woke up without a headache plaguing his skull. He rolled over, peeled one socket open and immediately shut it again; the light streaming in through the window was enough to dissuade him.

Wait.

He jolted up, looking around until he spotted an alarm clock on the bedside table, proudly announcing it was 11:43 in bright, neon green numbers. And his brother was nowhere to be found.

Red collected his clothes from their pile in the corner, and took his first proper look at them. The shirt was a lost cause, stain upon stain with holes all over the place, but his shorts were better off. His jacket, he was glad, was fine. Sure, there were holes mirroring the ones on his shirt, but nothing a new handful of patchworks wouldn’t fix. The marrow stains weren’t even that obvious on the black and red fabric. He shrugged it on after scouring Blue’s dresser for a new shirt, coming up with a white one, equally as uncomfortably tight as the one he’d worn to sleep. But it was better than nothing.

He could look worse, he supposed. 

His brother was in the living room, he discovered when he ventured downstairs, sitting on the couch next to The Stain.

“‘Sup,” he greeted, narrowing his eyes at his brother. “Y’said you’d wake me.”

Papyrus glanced towards him, smirked, and returned his attention to the TV. “No. I said I would  _ consider _ it.”

“Well, consider this. You, me, outside. Now.”

No longer filled with (as much) anxiety, Red finally knew how to deal with what had been plaguing him — the fresh batch of EXP coursing through his bones, left to stew there for days. And what better way to rid himself of it than get it beaten out of himself?

Edge laughed, “Alright, you’re on.”

“Is this an inside joke I’m missing, or…?” The Stain asked, looking between the two of them.

Edge took it upon himself to answer, “No, we are just going to… burn some calories, Stretch.”

Red chortled. “Stretch? Really? Well, I guess it’s more ethical than callin’ ya ‘The Stain’ in public.” 

That was apparently Blue’s cue to pop his head out of the kitchen. “What do you mean, burn calories?! You haven’t even eaten anything yet!” 

Red grit his teeth, unsure if he was up for another barrage of feelings and intent as a side to his… breakfast? Lunch? Whatever. He waved his hand dismissively, feeling his teeth pull up in a grin, “It’ll be fine. Oh, I stole one a’ya shirts, shrimp. I’ll try not ta ruin it.”

That seemed to sidetrack whatever train of thought — and scolding — that Blue had mentally prepared in less than three second. “Oh. Oh! Yeah, that’s fine!” He disappeared behind the wall again. Huh. He was surprisingly easy to handle, it turned out.

So Red and Edge went outside, with Stretch apparently deciding to join them. Fine by Red, as long as he didn’t get in the way.

He gets to poke fun, too. Bonus points.

“Sooo,” he started, peering up at Stretch, “I assume Paps said somethin’ ‘bout a stretchin’ rack? S’where it came from, right?”

Stretch, pulling out a smoke and lighting it, gave him a curt nod. “Yes. I’m starting to think that’s a normal occurrence in your universe. Said a lot more stuff, too.”

Oh buddy, you wouldn’t know half of it. Red held back a snort.

“Aw, I hope they were nice things. About me,” Red teased, taking a spot in the empty space they called a ‘backyard’, opposite Edge. “Well, were they?”

Edge didn’t seem affected much. Then again, he had been dealing with this for years. He materialized a bone construct in his hand, tip sharpened into a blade. “Your mouth is going to get you dusted one day.”

Red shrugged theatrically, pulling his hands out of his pockets for it, and then settled on a bone of his own in one hand. “Goin’ out in style or not at all.”

“Pay attention,” Edge warned him, lunging forward and crossing the distance between them in barely a blink. His downward slash was sidestepped.

“I always am, Boss.”

Red swung back, aiming for Edge’s still-outstretched wrist with much more viciousness than his posture betrayed. Edge yanked his bone up, parrying the attack like he’d expected it, and dug one heel into the snow to steady himself as he began pushing back. Both their constructs chipped where they clashed.

Red’s grin got wider.

He disappeared, leaving Edge to pull back as the loss of pressure made him lean forward. 

Red reappeared behind him, now with a bone in each hand. “I think  _ you _ shoulda pay attention!” Edge twisted and held one of the bones at bay with his. But as Red swung down with the other one, he was forced to step back, only for Red’s eyelight to flare up and bones to come up from the ground.

A veritable wall, it blocked Edge from moving back, but one of them struck out at his leg, lodging itself between Edge’s tibia and fibula with surgical precision, piercing straight through his boot.

Stretch watched from his spot on the porch, teeth grit and cigarette forgotten between them. His brother came out as well, apparently done with his cooking and took the scene in with wide eye sockets.

“Papy! Oh gosh, they’re fighting! Why are they fighting?!”

“They're just sparring,” Stretch supplied. 

Edge reached a hand out, stopping Red’s next attack mid-swing as he turned him blue, and slammed him down into the ground. Red grunted into a faceful of snow. In the next second, he yanked the bone constricting him from between his calf and turned it on his brother.

There was no intent to be felt in any of their attacks as they twisted in the snow, sending walls of bones to slow down each other’s lunges. The only thing that was almost tangible in the air was Red’s enjoyment. It might’ve just been his laughter at every attack that missed him, though.

Blue seemed to come to the same conclusion, because he was now rocking on the balls of his heels, fists shaking at his sides and stars in his eyelights. “Wowza! They seem to be having fun! It almost looks like mine and Alphys’ training!”

Stretch couldn’t help but smile. “Heh, yeah.”

“Do you think if I asked Red to spar with me, he’d agree?” 

Stretch wasn’t sure how comfortable he was with the idea of his brother fighting his alternate self, but judging by the way neither Red’s nor Edge’s HP had dropped at all, it’d be fine. Probably. “I dunno. Maybe?”

“I’ll have to ask him later!”

Red slammed into one of the trees, but even that was with a laugh, albeit a breathless one. Edge trapped him there with a cage of blue bones as he repaired the one chipping in his hand. Apparently satisfied it wouldn’t crumble in his grip, he lowered one of the blue bones and struck out.

Red was faster.

Edge stabbed at empty air, and hurried to jump back, skull twisting back. And, just as he’d expected, Red was right there, squatted on top of a Gaster blaster. The low hum of it charging was Edge’s only warning to duck, and the blast narrowly missed him, instead harmlessly pulverizing a patch of snow and throwing it into the air.

“Why do you insist on being so flashy with your attacks?” Edge asked, jumping onto the blaster even as it started dissipating to lock his brother into another bone clash.

“I ‘unno,” Red laughed, “Gotta end things in a  _ flash _ ?”

Edge made a disgusted noise. The blaster disappeared from beneath them, so he braced for impact, landing with barely a grunt. Red had, instead, jumped upwards, landing on another blaster. Edge rolled to the side to avoid the next shot.

Red was starting to sweat, one of his eyelights gone to power the other one. He teleported back onto solid ground, and the moment he did, he was trapped in another blue cage. 

“Yield,” Edge called, closing the cage on the top with more bones.

Red just grinned at him and threw the bone he’d been holding through a gap between the bones trapping him. Edge cocked his head to the right. It swished past him and lodged itself into the truck of another tree.

Two can play that game; bones rose around him, each of their pointed ends twisting and turning until they all honed in on Red. One by one they dropped, nothing but orange smudges in the air.

Red’s chest heaved with breaths as he watched them come closer. And closer. And closer yet.

One of them struck a blue bone, cracking it clean through loud enough to echo in his ear canals.

Another orange bone was mere centimetres from going through his nasal cavity. “I yield,” Red said. That stopped it dead in its track, as well as all the other ones.

Edge grinned victoriously, and all the bone constructs crumbled into nothing, leaving them both panting and full of adrenaline.

“Thanks, Paps,” Red said, his grin turning lopsided. He felt tired, yet energized at the same time. He could probably go for two more fights like this. The EXP no longer bubbled just under the surface of his bones, and he already looked forward to helping Edge with his own rush.

Then a thought struck him, ruining his afterglow; what if they did end up stuck here? Would Papyrus never dust another monster? Would Red be forever stuck with more EXP than his brother? For some reason, it didn’t sit well with him. No, he’d fix that damn machine. That was final.

“Well, I’mma go work on the machine,” he announced instead of thinking about it anymore. 

“You are not!”

Red looked over, startled. He had completely forgotten that Stretch had come with them, and now Blue was next to him, hands on his hips, but stars shining in his eyelights.

“You will come inside and eat first! No one passes up on the Magnificent Sans’ food!”

Edge’s sigh let Red know they were both thinking the same thing. Oh well, how long could a lunch take anyway?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so... sparring, am i right! its gonna play a bigger part in this story so im using this exposition as practice on writing action scenes because im not very confident at them. what can you do


	9. no, blue, that's culturally insensitive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> blue sets up a little fucky wucky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter; none but heehee

Red was about five seconds away from smacking his face through one of the walls.

Sure enough, he managed to grit his teeth through another taco, suppressing the shudders running down his spine. Next time he was hungry, he’d ask Paps to cook some pasta. Or he’d just up and do it himself for once.

Sure, Blue couldn’t taste his own intent and Stretch was probably used to it, but Red very much wasn’t. Edge wasn’t either, but he managed to not grimace.

“Your fight was so cool!” Blue gushed, finally wording what was on his mind the whole time. It had been more than obvious, from the way he practically vibrated in his seat.

“Fight?” Red and Edge shared a look, passing an entire conversation without words, and Red snorted.

“That wasn’t a fight, that was a spar,” Edge said. His look screamed pride.

Blue wasn’t deterred in the slightest, and with the widest grin they’d ever seen, he exclaimed, “I wanna spar with you, Red!” 

“ **_What_ ** ?!” 

Red jumped up, out of his chair, which made it clatter to the ground with a loud noise. His sockets had gone wide and he stared at Blue like he’d just grown another head. 

“No,” Edge said simply, leveling Blue with a blank look. The tension in the room could be cut with a knife.

“What,” Blue whined, “Why not?”

Red’s face went as heated as his namesake, and after a moment, his shell-shocked look was replaced by fury. He turned on his heel and marched out of the house, posture stiffer than a metal rod.

“Red! Where are you going?” Blue called after him, but his only reply was the door slamming shut. The walls shook just a bit, a couple tiny pieces of plaster raining down from the doorframe.

“Bro,” Stretch finally joined. He placed a hand onto his brother’s shoulder. Edge was glaring at them with the intensity of the Core itself. “You should head to Alphys’, you got training in a bit, don’tcha? You can ask Red later.”

“Oh, shoot! You’re right!” Blue jumped up, grabbed his boots and struggled to shimmy into them for a moment before he, too, was gone, though the door closing was definitely gentler.

Stretch sighed, shoulders slumping as he rubbed the side of his skull. “Should I even ask what that was about?”

Edge’s look turned calculating, though no less scathing. Stretch pulled out a bottle of honey from his hoodie and tipped it back.

“That look says no. Hm… So anyways, what was that about?”

Edge’s fingertips dug into the table. His voice was but a hiss as he whispered, “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but I will  _ not  _ let you toy with my brother.”

Stretch licked a stray dollop of honey that was stuck to one of his teeth. “I don’t know what the big deal is? Sans just wanted to spar?”

Physically having to restrain himself from turning Stretch’s soul blue and slamming him through one of the windows, Edge took a deep breath. He tried to rationalize past the boiling anger; either the two brothers were fucking with them, and by the  _ stars _ , Edge would not let his brother be yanked around in such a prank, or they legitimately did not understand the implications of such a question. 

“Why would he want to do something like that?”

It was Stretch’s turn to be confused. He cocked his head to the side and raised a brow, unsure whether the question was rhetorical or not. “Cause he loves sparring with people?” he asked more than answered.

Edge kept taking deep breaths. The tension was reaching the stages of uncuttable charcoal. “Never ask my brother that again, either of you,” he said, a thinly veiled threat, “It is highly inappropriate.”

“What’s up with you and all the cryptic shit? It’s just a fight.”

“Just a fight?!” Edge stood up, his chair joining the one Red had sat on on the floor. “Fighting and sparring are completely different!”

“What, how?”

“Sparring is reserved for special occasions!”

Alright, so maybe Stretch was getting a little worried. Not that he let it show, but maybe he was pushing one too many buttons. Eh, what was the worst thing that could happen, right? “Like?”

Edge stared down at him, and for a moment, with the way his browbones were drawn together in a sneer, the scars running across one eyesocket were even more obvious and ominous. He was doing his best to appear intimidating, and Stretch loathed to admit it was kind of working. “Sparring is reserved for family,” he said, like repeating instructions to a child for the fifth time, “for training and for your superiors. And for courting.”

Ah.

Stretch opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. Closed it.

“Ah,” he finally forced out, so very eloquent.

“And as your brother doesn’t fall into any of those categories, I would advise him  _ and _ you not to ever pull such a stunt again. Are we clear?”

“Uh…”

“Are. We. Clear?”

“Yep, yep, crystal.” Stretch was going to need another bottle of honey. And maybe a couple more, at the prospect of explaining to Blue that he’d just inadvertently flirted with his alternate self.

“Good. I will go find my brother,” Edge declared, obviously more than done with this conversation. The door slammed again, more plaster coalescing on the welcome mat in front of the entrance.

Alright, so that had been awkward. On more than one front. Stretch was gonna have to have another with Edge, because obviously their universes were vastly different. He shuddered; he did not want something like this to happen again.

But maybe he’d wait until they all cooled off. His shift started an hour ago, anyways,

* * *

Pull, twist, test, reconnect. Pull, twist, test, throw away. Pull, twist, test, reconnect.

Red moved through the motions, unplugging and replugging various cables after testing them, eyelights following their lengths to see what went where. 

No one had ever asked to spar with him. Edge didn’t count, they were battle brothers, they were  _ allowed _ , there was nothing weird about it. He’d never even been trained, Undyne just accepted him after a demonstration.

If his hands shook as he crossed the wires and threw some into a corner, there was nobody to see it.

Until there wasn’t.

“Brother,” Edge called, standing at the foot of the stairs. His voice was full of pity.

Red wanted to throw up the lunch. He hunched over further. Pull, twist, test, throw away. Pull. Twist. Test. Throw away.

A sigh resounded through the silent basement, followed by footsteps. Great, now he’d let his brother down, what the fuck was he doing, he was such a fuck-up—

“How is the machine looking?”

Red almost jumped; Edge’s voice was so much closer now, almost breathing down his neck. It was followed by his brother’s hand curling around his neck, phalanges resting on his collar. Red let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

Edge’s magic flowed between them, settling in the collar with the intent to protect. Heal. It wasn’t as scathing as what he’d felt eating his alternate’s food, nor was it as potent. No, instead it settled into the worn leather like it belonged there (and it did), nothing short of a metaphorical blanket.

Red couldn’t fight back a snort. “It’s a mess,” he said, dropping the two wires he’d been holding. They were faulty anyways. “Halfa it will have t’be replaced.”

Edge’s hand left his neck, leaving just the pleasant feeling of his magic in its wake. He turned his torso to return the favor, reaching past Edge’s scarf to pour his own magic into his collar. Edge hummed.

“You can do it.”

“Shut the fuck up, Pap,” Red bit back, though there was no malice in his voice. He didn’t need his brother’s pity, but stars, did it feel good knowing someone believed in him.

“Turns out this universe doesn’t discriminate between fighting and sparring,” Edge told him when Red’s hand dropped from his neck. Red’s shoulders squared up. “You should’ve seen Stretch’s look when I told him.”

Red groaned, “Great, so y’just explained to him how pathetic I’d been?”

“It was uncalled for, you little shit. There was nothing pathetic about it.”

“‘cept the part where I ran away from courting? Yeah, sure.”

Edge scoffed. “‘Courting’ by yourself, you mean?” He caught his brother around the neck again, but this time, it was in a headlock. Red groaned again.

“Don’t fuck’n noogie the skeleton!” he hissed as Edge did just that. He was thrown off in a second, but it had been worth it. “Dick! Now look at this mess!”

The blueprints Red had meticulously spread around himself so he could glance at the ones he needed were all over the place now. One of them had slid halfway across the floor, now stuck under the corner of the worktable. Red took to collecting them again.

Edge chuckled to himself as he watched his brother, making himself comfortable against the wall and stretching his legs with loud pops.

“This is the most I’ve ever seen you work, you know.”

Red crumpled up one of the unnecessary papers and threw it at him. Of course it was. This was his mess to fix.

* * *

“Your soul isn’t in it today!” Alphys yelled as she hurled another axe at Blue.

He ducked under it, out of breath. She was probably right. They had run a couple dozens laps around the Waterfall before their first match, and he was already getting tired. He couldn’t concentrate.

“Need a break?”

Gladly, he nodded and dropped to the ground, legs stretched in front of himself. His weapon disappeared from his hand. Alphys came over, armor clattering as she sat down next to him, axe set down within arm’s reach but no longer needed.

“Alright, what’s up?” she asked. She hadn’t even broken a sweat, and she had been on her feet from the early morning. Blue admired that. He admired a lot about her.

Wracking his mind on how to phrase everything, because obviously saying ‘ _ oh, not much! Just an alternate version of me and my bro coming in from another universe and almost dusting when we found them! But it’s cool, everything’s cool, they’re fine! They were sparring this morning so I asked… myself, if he’d spar with me too and he freaked out and I don’t know why! _ ’ wasn’t going to cut it. “The ceiling,” he said instead, with a small smile.

Alphys guffawed, leaning back on her hands as she threw her head back. “I walked right into that one, didn’t I? But really, what’s bothering you?”

Blue looked away and watched the sparkling crystals that dotted the cavern walls. “So… our uh… cousins… came over recently.” Nice one, Blue. “They’re from uh… Hotland. And I think I keep misunderstanding their customs? Because they were sparring this morning, but then at lunch, when I asked if Red wanted to spar with me too, he kinda… freaked out? And I don’t know why, he just went out!”

“Have you thought to ask why? I mean, they’d explain, right?”

“Of course! The Magnificent Sans thought of that! But they wouldn’t explain, and then Papy reminded me about our training, so I had to leave too.”

Alphys hummed in thought. “Well, I dunno much about Hotland. I mean, I kinda do? Undyne lives there, I guess. So maybe if you asked her, she could tell you? Though I’ve never really heard about something like that. I mean, who doesn't like sparring?!”

“Right?! That’s what I thought! Sparring is fun!”

Blue liked fighting people. Scratch that, he  _ loved _ it. Not because of the violence or anything like that, but because you could get to know the other person during a fight. Their movements, their actions, but most importantly, their  _ magic  _ itself would tell a story, would let you glimpse into their mind and life.

He knew Alphys very closely. They spent a lot of time together, and even though most of it was, of course, not spent in a battle, the battles they  _ had  _ shared had brought them infinitely closer. It got to the point where he would know what she would do before she would, and vice versa. It made for a truly thrilling experience, trying to figure out what to do to throw the other person off.

But maybe it was different where Red and Edge came from? The two of them seemed to share that same bond he was just thinking about, knew exactly what the other would do and worked around that. And their control of intent was maybe even better than Alphys’! Don’t tell her he thought that, though.

“I’m sure you can figure it out. But I’ve never heard you mention any cousins. Are they anything like Papyrus?”

Blue had to stifle a laugh. Not in the slightest, he thought. “Nope! He’s still the king of lazybones.”

“Well, that’s good. It’s hard enough to wrangle one skeleton to do his job. Maybe you could bring them over sometime. Even if you couldn’t make them spar with you,  _ I _ definitely could!”

He thought about it. They were staying, at least for the foreseeable future. It’d be good for them to meet his friends! They could probably go meet Undyne too, if she’d answer his texts instead of sleeping off her long anime-binging-watching nights again.

“How about we have a training session with them tomorrow?”

“Sure, I’ll bring a couple more training dummies,” Alphys said, casting a glance at the lone one that stood in front of her house. It was tattered and battle-worn, yet she never had the soul to replace it. It was a friend.

Blue stood up, dusted his pants, and placed his hands onto his hips. He already felt better, and he was sure Papy could tell him what had happened anyway. “Then it’s settled! The Magnificent Sans will bring his cousins tomorrow! Thanks, Al!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so anyways. uhhhhhhh alphys right  
> yeah


	10. tibia honest i don't have the stomach for lasagna

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> edge cooks and blue doesn't foreshadow disaster in the slightest. not a bit. nope.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no tws for this chapter just skeletons being dumb  
> check end notes for edge's lasagna recipe  
> the amazing art in this chapter has been drawn by my wonderful wife! find him [here](https://elsword.co.vu/) or here

“Ugh!” 

With a loud, guttural groan, Red threw one of his screwdrivers at the wall. It barely missed Edge’s head, slanted to the side in avoidance, and bounced off the plaster and onto the ground somewhere in a corner.

“Fuck this port!”

Edge watched on in rapt attention as Red threw more of his tools around, angrily stomping onto the pile of faulty wires he’d accumulated before kicking it. “Done throwing a tantrum?”

Red huffed, turning his attention to him. It seemed like a good time for a break, anyways; they (Red) had been at this for hours. “I’m j’st pissed.”

Edge raised a browbone. “Clearly.”

“Halfa these wires’re fried, and the ports’re not connected properly. Batteries are outdated and ain’t even ‘nough to power this hunk of junk. I’m missin’ like twenty parts and I only managed t’look through like, half the wirin’.”

Edge nodded. He knew _Red_ knew he had no idea how much any of that affected him being able to fix it, or the timeframe of it, but it was obvious he just needed to vent before he kicked the machine into scraps and then further into dust, maybe. “So, what do we do about it?”

Red, taking the hint that it really was breaktime, chucked the last screwdriver, still in his hand, at the table. It clattered among the mess as he stretched, joints popping soundly. “I ‘unno. I’ll prob’ly steal ‘em from the lab. Or maybe, since this ‘verse’s so _nice_ , Alphys’ll just give ‘em to me.”

Edge did not miss the dark look that passed over Red’s features at the mention of the lab. It was gone as soon as it had come, but that had been enough.

“Okay,” Edge said, before Red could even think about kicking the machine, “Stretch or Blue will take us. Let’s get out of here.”

“‘M hungry.”

Edge snorted through his nasal cavity. “Yeah, I think we both deserve food that doesn’t taste like unicorns and rainbows.”

“Lasagna?”

“Lasagna.”

* * *

Red had a couple mental comments on stealing food from the pantry of someone who let you live in their house, but Edge didn’t seem to share those. Or maybe he did, and just powered through them. Red wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter much.

What mattered at the moment was watching his brother stir the meat and tomato mixture. To Edge’s unending surprise and skepticism, he even offered to help. ‘I’m not letting you anywhere near my cooking,’ had been Edge’s reply, so, just to spite him, Red had sat on the counter, and hit his head on the upper cupboard in the process.

The tiniest bit of blue magic around the simmering pan had stopped Edge’s cackling. 

He wouldn’t admit it, but it made him feel nostalgic. Sometimes, ration day came sooner than they expected, or they had a little pantry-raid — after all, you didn’t need food if you were dust, right? And whenever that had happened, they’d indulge; Paps would make lasagna, with triple the ingredients necessary to call it such, and a couple times, Red had even gotten off his metaphorical ass and made a quiche to go along with it, with progressively weirder fillings every time it had happened. To be fair, it had only been three times, and at the third, Papyrus just said, ‘Never make anything like this again,’ so Red reveled in not doing anything.

Sure, such nostalgia had his head twitching in the direction of the window and door every couple seconds and his magic crackling just under the surface of his bones, but who gave a shit when Paps just looked so in the element as he put the noodles into boiling water.

His vigil hadn’t been for naught, however. Papyrus was putting the assembled dish (which resembled a crime scene of a human-on-human incident more than it did a pasta dish) into the oven when the front door opened.

Red’s eyelights snapped in its direction, one hand motion enough to raise a bone cage around the kitchen and lay a spiked trap onto the welcome mat.

From the open doorway, Stretch regaled him with a deadpan look.

“Oh, s’just you,” Red grumbled. The magic fell away, bones gone to allow him to come inside.

“Well thank the stars I didn’t teleport. Is this going to be a regular occurrence?” Stretch asked. He made his way towards the couch and sprawled himself on top of it like he owned the place — oh wait.

“How’re you still alive, anyways?” Red asked, low enough to not be heard, if Stretch wasn’t paying attention. Which he was.

“By talking things out? And not defaulting to attacking, mostly.”

Bummer.

“Speaking of, I wanted to talk.”

“Well, you sure seem to like hearing yourself,” Edge remarked, prompting a laugh from Red. 

Stretch shrugged, as much as he could while laying sideways with an arm propping himself up. “I tickle my own _funny bone_. So, about what happened…”

“Ohh no, I ain’t doin’ this shit!” 

Red was two milliseconds away from shortcutting somewhere, but Edge, ever the voice of reason, stopped him. “The lasagna will be done soon.” And he had to admit he was hungry, so he just huffed and stayed put. For now.

“Oh, did you get Red to cook like you said you would?”

Red, hearing this, threw a Look at his brother, silently asking him _what the fuck_ that meant, but Edge just ignored it. “No, don’t you dare compare the lasagna of the Great and Terrible Papyrus to Red’s… cooking.”

“Cool it with the implied quote marks, will ya?”

Stretch laughed from the living room, but he had enough self-preservation instincts to explain himself before either of them tore him a new one. “Has Blue rubbed off on you this much already?”

“What—”

Red snorted, though. “What? Nah! He’s been callin’ himself ‘Great and Terrible’ ever since he joined the guard!”

Edge’s glare could’ve dusted a monster where it stood. Red wasn’t affected. “Red, are you implying I am not, in fact, great _and_ terrible?”

“Never said that, _boss_.”

“My greatness aside,” Edge huffed, “ _What_ exactly do you want to talk about?”

The warning in his voice was more than obvious, so Stretch hummed as he thought about how to word it. He pulled a lollipop from his seemingly never-ending supply and popped it between his teeth. “So, you said sparring is a part of courting.”

Red’s skull heated up, and he was pretty sure he was going… well, _red_. He’d like to forget everything up until lunch, thank you very fucking much!

Edge looked through the small window on the oven door, deemed the lasagna done, and opened it. “Yes, I did. You can retain information, congratulations. Want a medal?” Soon enough, the steaming dish was placed onto the counter to cool.

Stretch, deigning to ignore everything after the first sentence, just continued, “So I wanted to ask more about your world. I dunno, so something like that wouldn’t happen again.”

Red and Edge shared a look. It was obvious neither of them was sure how to explain a world, especially to someone who lived in one so vastly different, apparently. And how do you explain the concept of kill or be killed to someone with no EXP to his name, anyway?

Because Edge was civilized, he grabbed a couple plates and thrust them at Red. His brother followed him to the table where they set it all down. Lasagna was best when fresh, after all. At least, that’s what he always said.

“All you need to know is don’t ask to spar. And asking to _fight_ is asking to die. And if Red looks ready to dust you, or anyone else, grab me.”

Red kept his gaze glued to the plate as Edge cut a piece of the pasta and dropped it onto it. “Same vice versa.” 

“Why?” Stretch asked, much closer than Red expected him to be. Fuck, he thought he was still on the couch, but no, he was sitting at the table with them, apparently.

“LV rush is a bitch,” he deadpanned. He stuck a forkful of the pasta into his mouth, and he could’ve cried right then and there, if he were a pansy. It was cooked expertly, and the intent in it was familiar. Nourishment, healing, and the barest, tiniest amount of care. It wasn’t cloying, and it finally allowed him to enjoy the taste.

“How’d you get so much LV, anyway? It couldn’t have been in self-defense.”

Red looked away, at anything and everything that wasn’t his brother or his… not-brother. “Not all of it,” he said through another mouthful.

“Orders, mostly,” Edge elaborated. He didn’t offer Stretch the food, but he also didn’t snap at him when he cut himself a piece. 

Stretch bit into some, and it was Red’s and Edge’s turn to leer at the uncomfortable grimace that passed over his face. “Wow, this is… good,” he said finally. It was obvious he was thinking something completely different, but whatever. A monster used to the mess they’d been subjected to before was never going to appreciate simple cooking, where the point was to restore HP and to taste the dish itself. 

“Little _bland_ for you?” Red teased, “Y’don’t have the _stomach_ for Edge’s cookin’.”

Edge ignored his pun, if only for the pride welling in his soul. Of course his brother liked his cooking. 

“Well, _tibia_ honest, I don’t,” Stretch threw back. The two of the guffawed, much to Edge’s chagrin. 

“Papy! I’m home!” 

“Oh look, ‘nother _bonehead_ ,” Red snickered, just barely stopping himself from unleashing another barrage of protective bones.

Edge looked ready to dust him just to shut him up, or maybe himself so he wouldn’t have to hear any more of it. And now he had to deal with _two_ of them?! Woe is him, his life is a downwards spiral of _suck_.

Blue skidded to a stop by the table and looked at the glass dish of lasagna in the centre of it. “Papy! Oh my stars, did you cook?!” 

Edge had to hide his expression behind a hand. It was an odd mixture of a scoff and a laugh, and Red was right there with him.

“Nah, Edgy me did.”

“Oooh!” Red watched as his eyelights flickered to honest, goddamned stars. “Can I try it?!”

“Knock yourself out,” Edge said, throwing Red a grin. His brother returned it, settling down for another show.

Blue loaded a plate with the lasagna; his excitement was almost palpable. Red’s grin turned feral as Blue put a forkful behind his teeth.

“Oh, this is great!” he exclaimed, to both Red’s disappointment and brotherly pride. Fuck yeah it was great, his _brother_ was great, but c’mon. At least Stretch had been affected. Blue seemed oblivious to his thoughts, which was probably for the best. “So I went to Alphys’ today! And she’d love to meet you guys!”

Red perked up. “Sweet. I need shit from her.” That cut down on the ‘steal what you need from the lab’ plan.

“Sans, I don’t wanna rain on your parade,” Stretch butted in, softly, “But what, exactly, did you tell her about uh… yeah?”

“Mweh heh! I told her Red and Edge were our cousins from New Home, of course! I couldn’t really think of anything else on the spot, but it’s fine!”

Edge raised a browbone, “Cousins. Really?”

“C’mon, it’s genius! You guys look like us, it’ll work out!”

“Psh, yeah, s’long as no one checks us,” Red grumbled, “Can’t really hide any of that.”

Blue wasn’t hearing any of it, though, still beaming as he tore through his plateful. It was honestly a little admirable. A _little_. “I’m positive it’ll be fine!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Howm'st to make the World's Best Lasagna, a recipe by The Edgiest Papyrus 
> 
> Step 1  
> In a Dutch (Ancient Human) oven, cook sausage, ground beef, onion (or MTT brand substitute), and garlic over medium heat until well browned. Stir in crushed tomatoes (or substitute with double the tomato paste, if there are no fresh tomatoes to be had. Fuck you, Grillby.), tomato paste, tomato sauce, and water. Season with sugar, basil, fennel seeds, Italian seasoning, 1 teaspoon salt, pepper, and 2 tablespoons parsley. Or just the salt and pepper, because the dump has been raided last weekend. Simmer, covered, for about 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.
> 
> Step 2  
> Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook lasagna noodles in boiling water for 8 to 10 minutes. Or 15, if you aren't a babybones. Drain noodles, and rinse with cold water. In a mixing bowl, combine ricotta cheese (or regular cheese. I'm the boss, I substitute whatever I want) with (non-monster)egg, remaining parsley, and 1/2 teaspoon salt.
> 
> Step 3  
> Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C), or more. The hotter, the better.
> 
> Step 4  
> To assemble, spread 1 1/2 cups of meat sauce in the bottom of a 9x13-inch baking dish. If you had broken it two weeks prior, whatever dish you have on hand will work. Arrange 6 noodles lengthwise over meat sauce. Spread with one half of the (ricotta??) cheese mixture. Top with a third of mozzarella cheese slices. Spoon 1 1/2 cups meat sauce over mozzarella, and sprinkle with 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese. Repeat layers, and top with remaining mozzarella and Parmesan cheese. Cover with foil: to prevent sticking, either spray foil with cooking spray, or make sure the foil does not touch the cheese. You do not want foil cheese. Not even my brother would eat that.
> 
> Step 5  
> Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes. Remove foil, and bake an additional 25 minutes. Cool for 15 minutes before serving. Or don't. Lasagna is best fresh.  
> \--  
> and because someone asked me and im unsure if i confused anyone else, ill copy paste my comment about the food & intent headcanon here;  
> My headcanon is that food, to be able to restore HP to monsters, needs to be cooked by a monster, and it kind of, soaks up the intent of whoever was cooking it. So whatever you feel while cooking it is gonna be felt. And well, the Fell bros are used to cooking kind of military-style? In that they go 'we need this to survive. this better restore as much HP as possible' combined with 'this is for my dumb brother, I won't let him eat shitty food'. The Swap bros (Blue mostly) just like, load it with positivity because he loves cooking and he loves his bro and 'this will make everyone happy!!'  
> So in theory it's like comparing grandma's loving dinner to like uh, ration bar.  
> hopefully that clears it up a bit for anyone who mightve been confused


	11. the values of a trigger-happy lizard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> meeting alphys goes about as well as you expect it to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; mention of the fell bros being murderers. let me know if anything else needs to be warned about

“ **Good morning!** ”

Red jerked upright, out of his not-so-dream, and for a second the curtains being thrown open seemed like a lab door opening, and he had to blink one too many times to realize it was just Blue, up to his loud shenanigans at… six in the morning, apparently.

“Five more minutes.” Red groaned, turned over, and threw the covers back over himself.

“There's a fifty-fifty chance of us killing you if you pull this. I hope you understand that,” Edge said, getting rid of his bone attack. Good old instincts. They had saved him more times than he cared to admit.

“You two need a better sleep schedule! You must sleep in a lot!”

Blue didn’t know what he was talking about. Red was used to being shoved off of his mattress at the crack of dawn, simply because Edge ‘thought they’d start patrol early.’ But even his brother enjoyed his rest when there was nothing pressing to do.

Edge, predictably, yanked Red’s blanket off. So much for ‘five more minutes’. 

He groaned again, with more feeling this time, and then yawned. “Whatever. Why’d y’wake us up, ‘nyways?”

“We’re going to Alphys’, duh! Come on, get dressed! Papy's making breakfast, so we have to hurry!”

Red wasn’t sure if Alphys would still be up at six after her nightly ‘work’, but maybe this universe’s Alphys had a different circadian cycle. Whatever. Blue knew her, so he’d take his word for it.

What Blue didn’t know was apparently the concept of privacy, and it took Edge not-so-subtly reminding him they needed to change for him to sputter out an, “Oh!” and finally let them. For wanting them to hurry, he was going about it the completely wrong way.

Edge’s armor shone with a polish — he must’ve cleaned it overnight; oh, the advantages of metal and leather — and he looked completely normal, especially next to Red, whose jacket still didn’t get the privilege of being patched up. 

“Clear?” Edge asked him when he stood still for a second too long. Nope, don’t worry bro, didn’t fall back asleep. Unfortunately.

“Clear,” Red nodded slowly, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Jus’ the usual.”

Edge’s sockets narrowed. He was giving him a once-over. “We’ll deal with your jacket later. It needs to be washed, too.”

“Heh, sure. Thanks, _boss_.”

“Our ranks mean little here.”

“So what?” Sure, Edge insisted on being called ‘boss’ while on duty, but that was mostly to keep up appearances. He was very particular on not being addressed as such when it was just the two of them, but Red was a little shit. A little bit of sarcastic inflection, and it had become a nickname, whether or not (definitely not) Edge liked it.

“You’re awful, that’s what.”

“Aw, gettin’ under yer _skin_? I thought it was thicker.”

“Sans!”

Red snickered, secretly glad for the diffusion. “See, y’should be more like me. Things j’st go _through_ me.”

“That’s enough!”

Knowing he’s pushed enough, Red left it be, though he had another pun already lined up on his metaphorical tongue. Better _bite_ it back.

Blue was waiting for them in the hallway when they left his room, much to both their surprises. “C’mon!” he beamed.

Red was tired just watching him. How the hell did he keep it up all day, and, more importantly, why? His happy-go-lucky attitude was starting to piss him off. And that was supposed to be him. Hah.

“Oh, good! The kitchen didn’t catch on fire!” Blue exclaimed when they got to the living room. The smell of scrambled eggs wafted from around the corner.

“Are ya f’cking serious?” 

“That was once!” Stretch yelled back, “Compared to your nineteen times, I’m fine.”

“Nine— nineteen?!”

Blue chuckled, finger hooking in his bandanna and tugging the barest amount. “Alphys’ fault.”

Edge was barely able not to smack a hand against his skull, and instead just rubbed at where his temple would have been if he had flesh. “I’m going to have to agree with my brother’s previous statement. How, exactly, are you two still alive?”

Stretch came out of the kitchen with four plates — one and two respectively in each hand, and one… on his head? It wobbled precariously and, to absolutely no one’s surprise, started falling when he was setting the other ones down. He was able to grab it before it could spill all over the floor (and what a shame, Red would’ve _loved_ to see that), but not without a small string of curses that his brother huffed about.

This day was already off to a great start and it wasn’t even seven.

Red groaned.

* * *

He offered to teleport them — ‘them’ being himself and Edge — but Blue shot him down immediately, spouting nonsense about staying fit and getting in some exercise. They were magical skeletons, for fuck’s sake!

Which meant the River person — or was it Gaster in this universe? — was also out of the question. Maybe he was secretly kind of glad for that. He wasn’t sure he could handle seeing ‘Dings again, even if it wasn’t _really_ ‘Dings.

But he was _not_ looking forward to a trek to Hotland. Or any trek at all. An uneasy feeling sunk its claws into him and refused to let go. Anyone they passed by was just… out and about. The first time he heard a call of, ‘Hi, Sans!’ aimed in their direction, he had to stop himself from outright freaking out. And Blue just waved back, like it was a completely normal thing.

What the genuine fuck.

When Stretch and Blue told them monsters didn’t fight here, it wasn’t a kill-or-be-killed world, he thought he understood. Because, in theory, he did. But seeing everyone being… nice? Were they nice? Did they have ulterior motives? Was it all a big charade? He didn’t understand in practice, apparently.

Something or someone must’ve been looking down at him and feeling pretty generous, though, because they didn’t go to Hotland. As they made their way through the Waterfall, Red silently thanked whatever deital force might have existed. 

Alphys seemed to be at Undyne’s. Which, was pretty unusual for Alphys, who he could only remember leaving her lab _once_ , and even then, it was only because of Mettaton, but this Alphys might have been different. Bunch of things already were.

Blue sped ahead as they neared the house. Nobody else shared his enthusiasm or energy for a ‘jog’, and Red took the time to take it in. It looked similar to what he was used to, but with a noticeable lack of red paint, which was a real shame, in his opinion. The cave walls were also marginally more intact.

Blue knocked on the teeth-door, though perhaps banged was a better descriptor. The echo made Red’s spine tingle.

The door opened, and there stood… Alphys.

If Red’s jaw wasn’t attached to the rest of his skull, it would’ve been on the ground right now. Yeah, sure, lizard. That was all well and good, but where the hell was her lab coat? Or glasses? And she wore armor? _And_ she had scars across her face that could rival Paps’? She looked like she walked out of the Royal Guard. _Their_ Royal Guard.

“Hi, Sans! You’re here early!” she greeted, a hand placed on her hip. Yup, that was most definitely armor, and it clattered as such. She peered at them over Blue’s shoulder. “Ooh! And you brought your cousins! Hiya, I’m Alphys, nice to meetc—”

Several things happened then, all at the same time.

Red could feel the telltale prickling of a check in his bones.

An axe lodged itself into the ground, trailing yellow magic, right where he had stood a millisecond ago. He stared at it from his new spot, a couple feet back. His eyelights moved back to Alphys.

Edge was brandishing a bone construct, already a step ahead and covering Red’s blind spot. Red was already in place to cover his.

Stretch had been shoved towards Blue, and Alphys now stood between the pairs, holding another yellow axe and staring intently at Edge.

Red kept his hands in his pockets and counted to five in his head.

“What the hell!” Alphys roared, “Sans! These are murderers!”

Blue moved back between her and them, holding his hands in front of himself in surrender. Or maybe it was meant as a placation in this universe.

“I uhh… I can explain!”

“You better, punk! And their—” Alphys snarled, rereading the invisible words over and over. “—names! What is going on!”

“They’re us from an alternate universe, basically,” Stretch supplied, oh-so-helpfully.

Alphys turned to him with the funniest impression of someone who’d just been told the Hotland is freezing. Red was barely able to stop his snort. Though, to be fair, at this rate, Hotland very well _might_ be a frozen tundra in this universe. He just didn’t know.

“What?”

As subtly as he could, Red kicked Edge in the shin. A scathing glare later, when he was sure his brother’s attention was garnered, Red motioned to his bone with his chin and shook his head.

Edge let the sharp construct disappear, but he didn’t look too thrilled about it.

Ever so nonchalant, Stretch shrugged. “Yeah, these aren’t our cousins. They’re basically us.” Red was starting to think apathy might not be as good as he’d used to believe.

And so, Alphys turned to Sans, “You said they were your cousins!”

Blue looked about as uncomfortable as Red was feeling. Which was to say, very much so. “I panicked! I didn’t think you’d believe me if I told you a pair of our doppelgangers turned up in Snowdin and were living with us until they fixed a universe-traveling machine or something like that!”

Alphys’ axe lowered a smidgeon, but then she tightened her grip and leveled both Red and Edge with a sharp look. “Even if they are… you, they’re still murderers. There’s no way someone gets five levels in self-defense.”

Red burst out laughing, finally, and barely a moment later, Edge’s voice joined the echo of his.

“Yer right,” he said, “Only three of ‘em are from self-defense.”

“Oh, I can’t believe you kept count,” Edge said through a chuckle.

“Eh, someone has ta. Now, I don’t planta get ‘nother LV rush ‘nytime soon,” Red shot a glance at his brother, and his grin turned lopsided, “and my bro doesn’t either. But if it’s a _fight_ missy Captain o’ Royal Guard wants, I’m willin’ to provide.”

Blue frowned at him, narrowing his sockets. “Red, you’re not helping!”

“Actually, I need to catch up to your EXP,” Edge noted, if only because it made Blue throw his hands in the air and huff.

“ _You’re_ not helping either! Alph, I swear they’re fine!”

Alphys obviously wasn’t persuaded. “They should be turned in to the Queen.”

Red’s marrow ran cold at that, despite all his previous jokes. His grin froze on his face. Edge must’ve noticed, he _always_ noticed, and Red wasn’t sure if he liked or hated it. Sure, this universe might have been wimpy and he could dust half of it without breaking a sweat, but if ‘The Queen’ was anything like Asgore… “Pass,” he grit out. “I j’st needed coupla components, but yer not the person fer that. _Obviously_.”

“Who _is_ the Royal scientist here, if not Alphys?” Edge asked the silent question for him.

Alphys’ eye narrowed. If glares could kill someone, Edge would’ve been a pile of dust right then and there. “Ohh no. I’m not letting you anywhere near Undyne!”

Well, that answered the question.

The next question on the test was how the fuck he’d get the materials needed for the dumb hunk of junk Stretch called a machine with Alphys gripping her axe and looking ready to (try to) maul them again without having to dust her.

Teleporting to the lab and stealing what he needed was becoming more and more enticing by the second. Too bad that probably wasn’t very ‘polite’ or whatever. Back to the drawing board. Edge and Stretch were of no help, but Blue...

“If keeping an eye on them will ease your mind, why don’t you come along?”

Red was going to strangle him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter mightve ended up having one too many swears but i swear (heh) that writing red without them just doesnt feel right
> 
> edit; yes i went back and deleted 7 whole words because i wanted a nice word count. dont @ me asdfgh


	12. a box of wires with a side of panic attack

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> red gets his wires. and a little something extra

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; implied assisted suicide
> 
> sorry about the posting gap, ive had... a week. anyways! ive added an illustration to chapter 10, provided by my lovely wife! please [go check it out](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27122108/chapters/67062007)

Alright, okay. So Red did not strangle Blue.

Yet.

But being forced to make the trek to Hotland, which he didn’t want to do in the first place, combined with the fact that Alphys had an axe out and kept one step behind them like she could even hold a candle to either of their magics, was ticking him off _just_ a little bit. 

The closer they got to the lab, the more uncomfortable he grew. After the incident, he’d strayed away from Hotland in itself as much as he could. Finding a vacant house in Snowdin had been a bonus, and he’d grown to like how different it was. Cold and almost perpetually snowing. And no Core to be found anywhere. Obviously.

Alphys’ own experiments had turned her into a recluse searching for more and more results, and Red had lost the only other person he could feasibly call a friend, aside from Edge. Maybe ‘friend’ was too strong of a word, but him and Alphys had only ever tried to kill each other twice, which was marginally more than could be said about anyone else.

The building came into view too soon, while simultaneously not soon enough.

Blue ‘knocked’ on the front entrance just like he had banged on Alphys’ door before. From inside the lab, several loud thuds and a couple muffled yelps could be heard, and then the door opened.  
  
The Undyne standing before them was tall and lanky, nothing like the captain Red was used to. Even without the imposing armor, Undyne’s strength was always obvious, her muscles sculpted from years of vigorous training. Just thinking of it made Red want to take a nap. But this one, dressed in a stained lab coat, with hair standing in every which way, looked like a bad facsimile.

“Heya, Undyne!” Blue said. With his lack of volume control, it was more of a shout.

“H-hey, Sans. P-Papyrus? A-Alphys?! What… brings you all h-here?” Undyne’s eyes skimmed over them, until she noticed Red and Edge in the back. “Who’s… this w-with you?”

“They’re our uh… cous—”

“Sans!”

Blue jumped to attention, looked sheepish for half a second, and then sighed. “I… I don’t know how to explain it.”

Red rolled his eyelights. “So, parallel universe theory, right? Me ‘n my bro,” he motioned to Edge, who was, for some reason, doing his best impression of a brooding pile of bones, “are, well. Those two fuckers. From a different universe.”

“Language, Red!”

“Whatever, whatever, shrimp. Now, fishstick, I need some wires ‘n junk to fix up the machine and get the hell outta here.”

Undyne had gone still, her eyes wide as she listened. “Is this a j-joke? Or a-are you serious?!”

“I’m as serious as they get, fish bitch.”

“You will not speak to Undyne like that!” Alphys bellowed, shoving Red against the wall of the lab with a loud noise.

Red shrugged off the fractional hit to his HP and leveled her with a flat look. “Y’better let me go, right now.”

Edge’s magic was crackling in the air already, ambient and hot. Any time Red was the negotiator, this happened. Not that Edge wouldn’t use it, but he didn’t need backup. Alphys glanced toward him, and then let go of Red’s hood. “Just— watch your mouth!”

“Whatever y’say, missy captain. Now, fishstick, will ya get me what I need, or should I steal it?”

Undyne was still quiet, but being addressed again seemed to startle her out of whatever line of thought she was heading down on. “O-oh! Yeah. Yeah! C-come on in! I— Wow! This is huge! This is… a-amazing! This— this p-proves that parallel universes are r-real! Oh stars! I-I need to look into t-this! What’s your universe l-like? You have to t-tell me everything!”

Red shrugged and followed her inside before she could try and physically pull any of them. The others followed, jabbering something among themselves, though Red had tuned them out the moment his foot stepped over the threshold. 

It was… messy.

That was the first thing he noticed; instant food packaging was strewn across the floor, overflowing from the trash can, there were blueprints littered across the — conspicuously dusty — workbench, and the light was so dim that his eye actually cast some red light around.

“—and, and, y-you gotta tell me! Is your Undyne… cool?”

There was a lack of chemical smells in the air, and the dissection table upstairs was wooden instead of metal. The True lab door was a bathroom sign.

Red… wasn’t panicking. His shoulders sagged the barest amount.

“Heh. Sure, she’s Paps’ role model.”

“I will have you know the Captain is a formidable woman,” Edge said, giving the building about as much attention as was needed for a clean sweep. Their eyelights met for a second and they nodded at each other.

“T-t-the Captain?!” Undyne gasped, and stopped dead in her tracks.

“Alph is our… heh… Royal scientist.”

“That’s amazing! C-can you tell me how you… managed to break through t-the universal barriers? I mean— traveling to another universe must’ve taken so much power! There’s so many calculations to run! So… so many variables!”

She unfolded the bed from its Incredibly easy-to-draw orb shape and sat down on it. Red took it as his cue to steal her work chair, and, after thinking about it for half a second, sat on it backwards, just so he could prop his chin on his forearms.

“Me ‘n ‘D— my boss, we worked on shit t’gether, with Alph too. Came up with a theory, but it was s’pposed to move us in time, ‘n not… through universes. So I had this hunk of a machine stuck in m’basement ‘n worked on it fer coupla years, an’—”

“As smart as my brother is, I am not feeling up for a lecture in thermodynamics of moving through space-time,” Edge grumbled before he twisted on his heel.

He was halfway down the escalator before Blue caught up to him, which in turn meant Stretch and Alphys were behind him as well. “Ah, where are you going?”

“Out of this stuffy nightmare of a building, what’s it look like?”

“How about you come with me and Al, then! I know you don’t want to fight, or spar, or whatever, but! It’d be nice if you could come to our training! Maybe you could give us some pointers!”

“Sans, what the hell!”

Edge raised a browbone. “Pointers? Why would I teach _anyone_ how to fight properly?”

“Cause, I mean! Watching you and Red fight was… amazing! I’m sure we could learn a lot from you!”

From the back, with another lollipop stuck between his teeth, Stretch grinned. His bro was so cool. And knew exactly how to get someone to do what he wanted, if Edge’s cheekbones flushing the barest red was any indication.

“W-Well, of course you could! I am the Great and Terrible Pa— Edge, after all! Very well, I accept!”

Stretch wasn’t surprised it had worked. It works on him all the time.

* * *

Talking with someone who understood, and actually seemed to care about what he was saying — what a wild concept, honestly — was… refreshing, truth be told. Red wasn’t sure how he felt about it, or about the fact that this Undyne was an absolute pushover, stammering left and right and tripping over her own words.

Red almost refused to come down into the True lab when she told him he could have his parts. Almost.

Rule number two of survival: never show weakness.

So there they were, in a moving elevator hidden cleverly behind a bathroom sign, plummeting downwards. He had to give props to that idea. His Alphys was never ashamed of her experiments or of the lab, and her door sported a big sign warning anyone that entering would end with very, very painful dusting for them.

The elevator dinged, and the door opened.

Red was hit by the smell of disinfectant.

And suddenly, he was standing in the Core, in the observation room number twelve, with the extracted DT in his hands, the railing to his left, and ‘Dings to his right. His soul pounded in his ribcage. The smell of disinfectant mixed with the smell of sulfur and clogged his throat, despite the fact that shouldn’t have been possible.

_“Sans, come now.”_

‘Dings’ words did nothing to fill up the oppressive silence. The only thing that did was the occasional bubbling and fizzing of the lava beneath them.

_“You know this is the only way to power the mechanisms.”_

He did. He did know. ‘Dings had designed the Core himself — his final out.

Red gripped the vial. It was so small, so _bright_ , so wrong. He had a syringe in his other hand. Already?

His ear canals rung. His voice didn’t sound like his own.

“C’n I— C’n I talk y’out of it? Somehow?”

‘Dings had smiled at him, eyelights trained to the railing and the sight of lava behind it. “ _No_ ,” was all he’d signed.

Red knew that already, knew as soon as Asgore threatened to cut their funding for a ‘lack of results’. He knew as soon as he’d seen the blueprints for this room for the first time.

You can’t have a source of power without something to draw it from, and, well… the heat wasn’t cutting it. But what about a boss monster’s soul, refusing to fade from existence with the extra help of some DT?

Without his permission, his hands, shaking as they were, drew out the viscous DT into the syringe.

" _I’m very glad you understand, Sans._ ”

His whole body shook.

The elevator dinged.

“A-a-are you… okay?”

Red blinked against the lab’s light. The smell was gone. He was still shaking. His hands were holding a box full of metallic pieces and wires.

“Huh?” he asked, so very eloquently, as he turned to Undyne. 

She seemed pale, for some reason. “Oh, thank the s-stars! You wo-wouldn’t respond to me! I thought you’d seen a g-g-ghost!”

It took a moment for Red’s mind to process the words, and another moment for him to come up with a response. “Heh, there ain’t no ghosts in the lab, are there? J’st the amalgamates?”

If Undyne had looked pale before, it was nothing compared to how white her skin went when he said that. “How do you know about that,” she asked, so quiet he had to strain to hear.

Red shrugged and adjusted the box in his arms. He could still feel how the syringe felt in his hand. His fingers flexed involuntarily. “Ain’t much of a secret in my place. At some point, Al had gotten the okay from His M— Asgore, to grab ‘nyone I dealt a death penalty. So sometimes I’d cut the judgement short ‘n bring the poor suckers ta her lab, so she could have their souls, y’know.”

“I-I don’t… think I wanna know more about your place a—anymore…”

Red’s teeth quirked up in a grin. “Eh, it ain’t such a bad place. Y’get used ta it.”

He looked down at the box.

A roll of 3 gauge wire, taped together so it wouldn’t go all over the place? Check. A tangle of 8 gauge wire? Check. Stray pieces of 10 gauge, moving all around? Check. Micro-ATX motherboard, _not_ fried? Check. Slightly-cracked liquid crystal display? Sure, check! He’d only wanted whatever was available, but if she wanted to give out expensive shit like it was goddamn Gyftmas over here, who was Red to stop her? Couple phase rings so he wouldn’t blow up the house? Check. She even added a pair of pliers, how nice of her.

Undyne had found him everything he’d asked for. How long have they been in the lab for? He couldn’t remember.

She looked away from him, nervously scratching the back of one hand with the other. It looked like she wanted to say something, but was holding herself back.

“Welp, y’got me everythin’ I need. Uh… thanks? I guess?”

“Y-yeah! No problem…” And back to looking away she went. Her anxiety was even more obvious than Red’s was. What a joke. “A-anyway! If you— you can— you can always bring the machine h-here, if you… if you want any help! I would— I’ll do my best!”

Red snorted through his nasal aperture. “Sure thing, fishstick. I’ll keep it in mind.”

His hands shook the whole way outside, but at least the pieces clattering in the box masked it.


	13. 'big' bro's big responsibility

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> edge deals with blue's interesting fighting style and red's belated fallout. neither of those is fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; dissociation, (minor) self harm. and math. let me know if anything else is needed to be warned about  
> i would like to point out each dissociative/triggered/flashback episode is different, and yes, they can be belated. this is just one kind im familiar with, thats why im including it  
> i would also like to point out a couple lines at the beginning could possibly be constructed as red/edge. this is not the case. please dont. thank you!

The training ground could hardly be called that on a good day, and Edge was not having a good day anymore. Not without his brother, and while knowing he was at the lab.

They had returned to Alphys’ house at a jog. Blue had called it ‘practice’, but Edge wasn’t convinced, mostly because somehow, he’d made it there before either of them. There stood a lone, battered dummy. Even it was in a better state than any training dummy he’d ever seen, which wasn’t giving him much hope.

He shouldn’t have agreed. He should have stayed at the lab, his own discomfort be damned. He didn’t remember much about it, but then again, he’d just been getting out of stripes when Red had worked with Gaster, or ‘Dings, as he called him. The two of them were the driving force behind the whole Core operation shebang, though he knew Red didn’t take much credit.

Or maybe it had been on purpose, because coming home from their poor excuse of a school to see his brother patching up their father’s newest cracks was not something he’d so soon forget. There wasn’t much leeway with only two HP, compared to their father’s.

But Edge knew. He’d seen Red’s works, all his notes and plans that he couldn’t make heads or tails of no matter how hard he’d tried. His brother was smart, so smart, and deserved the world. Losing Gaster had left him nigh catatonic, every last ounce of desire for knowledge and his dreams lost to the void.

In the streets, Red had done what had to be done to keep him safe, exchanging his lab coat for a title of the Judge. Maybe the apathy towards anything _not Edge_ had helped Red during that time, even kept his LV rush at bay for the most part, but Edge had been determined to make it up to him.

You can’t owe anyone, after all, not even family.

At least, that’s what he told himself, when he remembered Red’s excited tone and bright eyelights as he told him about the sky and the stars and the vastness of space he’d so wanted to study, while gazing fondly at a broken telescope that had washed down from the world above.

Red had humored him with training. Rules were strict in the Underground, and so were customs, but Red had a way of bending them just enough to stay within the line while still stepping over it. ‘Sparring is reserved for family,’ was meant for partners, _couples_ and their children, but Red hadn’t batted an eyesocket, said, ‘ _Sure, s’what bros're for,_ ’ and just took him to the dump, a secluded little spot at its outskirts, and taught him how to construct a bone sharp enough to cut metal, how to build a cage meant to detain and retain, how to lay traps in places no one would expect.

He could’ve left Edge, gone on to live his life without worrying about an overly-emotional, too-loud barely-adult. But he _didn’t_.

And Edge had repaid his brother’s _kindness_ . He’d worked tirelessly for years, filling the empty space with bones so thin they could pierce an ant or so sharp they could level buildings. Learned how to will someone to ignore gravity and slam them onto his blade. The only thing he could never do was summon a blaster, but Red hadn’t given him any pity nor disgust at the failure, just taught him how to place a bone trap behind someone and press them until they backed themselves into it. He’d started greeting Red with a slew of bones, and it was all _worth_ it for the prideful grin it’d earn every single damn time.

He’d always ignored how deep Red’s affection ran, because no one else had ever shown him such. Not even their father, not to that extent.

Undyne he’d almost begged, but after so long, his strength was unmistakable, and if he’d had three more minutes, he would have had her down for the count instead. 

Red had hugged him that day.

Edge pretended not to notice that Red had cried into his new armor, one of the two times Edge had ever seen him do such. He pretended not to see a lot of things about his brother, like the vacant look in his sockets when he returned from the castle, or the affection that was only going to come bite him in the ass when someone decided to come for him. 

Edge was a hypocrite, because when Red had been kidnapped, he had dusted twelve monsters himself. Red had been fine.

He accepted Edge’s offer to join the guard as a sentry when a position opened up. They no longer had to spar out of sight, and when he’d noticed people stopping and _staring_ , he finally understood Red’s pride. His lazy, ‘good-for-nothing’ brother, who told puns like his measly HP depended on it, who was the Judge, who had more EXP than the entirety of Snowdin combined, was _strong_. And now everyone knew.

He could look after himself, and when he couldn’t, he had Edge there to do it for him. Which is what he’d do as soon as he saw him again. He’d hear that damned ‘clear,’ if it was the last thing in his life.

Which is why he turned his attention to his brother’s lookalike and what was a stand-in for Undyne in this universe. She was loud, obnoxious, she had tried to dust him upon meeting, but something was missing, and it wasn’t just the scars.

Axes were fundamentally different from spears, but they were manageable. Edge found himself slipping into the familiar pattern of observe-analyze-deal with.

Blue stood in one half of the ‘grounds’ and Alphys took the other one. “We’re gonna start!” he called to Edge, like he couldn’t see. He waved half-dismissively.

It was Alphys who started. With a sprint, she threw her axe at Blue, who sidestepped only to be met with another. Magical sparks flew between the yellowish axe and his blue bone.

“Pointless use of energy,” Edge remarked. “If she stopped pushing, your bone would just go through. Use normal bones.”

Blue’s browbones scrunched; there was no doubt he’d heard.

He jumped back, but his construct didn’t turn white like Edge expected. Instead, it stretched, energy coalescing at its tip. Before Alphys’ next lunge, he held an entirely oversized mallet.

Edge frowned. There was no way that would be practical to wield.

Blue swung the mallet down — “Too left.” — and completely missed Alphys. She jumped up on top of it, but Blue surprised Edge. He was ready for it and used the momentum to execute a fairly impressive handstand somersault. “Too much force.” And careened right past Alphys down onto the ground.

Alphys was trying her damndest to set him on fire with her eye alone. Why did he agree to this again?

* * *

Stretch, who had been sent ‘on shift’ before this whole mess even began, popped up just around the time Blue and Alphys were getting winded. Edge was more than happy to see him. Not for any reason pertaining to _him_ , but because his arrival must’ve signaled the end of this training.

Alphys flopped to the ground and pulled a water bottle out of her inventory, drinking half of it and pouring the other over her head like it was something to be wasted. Edge was disgusted.

“Hey, Papy!” Blue greeted as he sat down next to Alphys.

“Yo. How’s it sitting?”

Blue narrowed his eyesockets, but apparently it wasn’t a bad enough joke to warrant a scolding. Red had never done anything but laugh at Edge’s jokes. “We just finished. I’ll have to stop by the store on the way back, what do you want for dinner?”

Stretch shrugged. “I dunno. We still got tacos in the fridge, but I think those need to be thrown out by now.”

“I can make new ones!”

He could _feel_ himself get more and more angry by the second. These bumbling buffoons were acting like food was something to be wasted, like it was _okay_ to just pour water onto the dirt!

“You disgust me,” he said, “What else do you just throw away and waste? Revolting.” Two and a half pairs of eyes turned to him, but he’d had just about enough and pushed himself off the cavern wall. “I will go find my brother.”

“Wait, Edgy, I can call Un...dyne...”

Edge’s boots crunched tiny pebbles and plants under them, heels all but suicidal for anyone but him. If he stomped his feet a bit harder when he saw a rock, so be it. His fists shook by his sides, and the trek to the lab was remarkably shorter on his own.

He stood before the large door for a moment, got his temper under reins and knocked. One, two, three, as is customary.

Like deja vu, echoes of thuds and mumbles came from the other side before it opened. Undyne looked disheveled, hair askew in its bun and her lab coat still buttoned one hole off. “O-oh, it’s you… Uhm… E-Edge?”

“Correct. I am taking my brother.”

“Your… brother? O-oh, he u-um… he left al-already. Like, a-ages ago.”

Edge’s features set into a scowl. Undyne looked like she wanted to dig herself a hole straight through the floor and disappear into it. Despite looking pathetic and _weak_ , Edge still seemed to hold a shred of respect for this woman, so he said, “Understood. Excuse the intrusion.”

He only caught a glimpse of surprise passing over Undyne’s features, her eyes — still so strange to see both — widening. He gripped his phone in his hand and typed a message to Red. He refused to acknowledge the feeling in his chest as concern.

‘ _Where did you go, brother?! I thought you were at the lab!!_ ’

The read checkmark popped up almost instantly, but there was no reply, no matter how much he glared down at the cracked screen.

* * *

“Oh, hey, Edge!” was the first thing he heard when he got back to the house.

Blue was in the kitchen and Stretch was passed out on the couch. No Red to be found anywhere.

“Where’s Red?”

“He’s down in the basement working on the thingy. Told him the tacos were done, he said he’d be right here! Mweheh, sorry, Papy was gonna text Undyne but you left before he could. He looked sad about something, though...”

“I see.”

He felt like he’d been on a wild goose chase, but if his final stop would be the basement, then it didn’t matter. He ignored Blue’s offer of tacos for now), thinking to the ones that were probably crammed in the trash can.

The trapdoor’s hinges screeched as he pulled it open.

“Red? Why did you not text me back?!”

His heels clicked on the steps. He came to a stop and stared down at his brother. He sat, cross legged, in the middle of the floor, surrounded by double the amount of papers he’d had before. A box laid sideways a little off to the side, spilling wires all over. It didn’t look like he had moved for a long time. His phone was next to him, display lit up and showcasing Edge's message.

“Red, I am talking to you.”

Red’s back was hunched, the machine in front of him, halfway disassembled. Or maybe reassembled, Edge couldn’t tell.

“Red!”

The screwdriver in his hand rhythmically clinked against his patella, like a ticking clock. Fed up and with a growl, Edge circled the pile of papers and leaned down.

“ _Sans!_ ”

Red jumped then, as much as one could jump while sitting. His sockets went wide as a deer’s in the headlights, and he tumbled to the side with the motion, skull hitting the floor with a sick noise. The screwdriver ended up in the corner, splattering red. Edge, frowning, angry, and definitely _not_ worried!, gave him a once-over.

The tangle of wires coming from the box and the machine coalesced around him, a length of red and yellow wires wound in a spiral against each other and through his tibia and fibula. They were pulled taut now, almost yanking something out of the machine. Red stared up at him with vacant eyesockets. His other knee was covered in marrow.

He looked like he always did when he’d spent the whole day at the castle.

Like he’d looked the first time, when Edge had finally found him at the Core, sitting on the edge of a pool of lava.

Edge had known he should never have left him in the lab alone.

He dropped down onto his knees and pulled him up. “Sans, what is the series sum of 125 to the power of two through 150 to the power of two?” he asked, doing his best not to tisk when he saw all the bleeding chips in his brother’s patella.

“...what?”

“Series sum of 125 to the power of two through 150 to the power of two. What is it, Sans?”

“125 t’ the power of two is 15625.”

“Yeah.” He started untwisting the wires from around each other, looping the red through the gap of Red’s calf and throwing the tangle towards the machine.

“150 to the power of two is 22500. 15625 plus 22500 is 38125.”

Edge had already forgotten what he’d even asked, but apparently Red didn’t. He checked his brother’s skull and was relieved to see no fracture from the fall. Red was shaking in his hold.

“22500 min's 15625 is 6875, divided by two’s 3437.5.”

“Yeah?”

His hand glowed green as he healed the patella. The marrow he wiped off with the edge of his scarf; there was a shallow chip leftover when he was done. But at least it wasn’t bleeding anymore.

“3437.5 times 38125 is 131054687. An’ a half.”

And now it was time to play the repeating game. He’d get to that ‘clear,’ sooner or later. “Good job. Blue made tacos for dinner, come on.” He pulled Red up to his feet, but it was obvious if he let go, he’d just crumple down again. So he didn’t let go.

“He did?”

“He came in to tell you earlier.”

“He... did?”

“Yes. I don’t know how you fooled him into thinking you were just ‘sad’ while dissociating.”

“I did? I d’ssociated?”

“You still are.”

“...I am?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and now i will proceed to shamelessly plug mine and my wifes AU comic, Heart of Gold. [please check it out!](https://heart-of-gold-au.tumblr.com/)


	14. underground's number one therapist and listener

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> blue helps red calm down, and edge visits muff's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; (past) assisted suicide. let me know anything else that needs to be in here

“Stairs,” Edge noted, keeping a hand on the back of Red’s hood.

“‘Kay.” His brother was in full auto-pilot mode. He would probably do anything Edge told him. He entertained the thought of His Majesty doing just that, and grimaced so hard it was a wonder his jaw didn’t dislocate. His brother had a few glaring weaknesses, and he was almost enraged at himself that he’d never even thought others had taken advantage of them.

“Inside.”

The door clicked shut behind them, locking out the chill. Red stood two paces in front of him, hands stuck in his pocket and no doubt clenching and unclenching. Edge glanced at the other skeletons still sitting at the table and then back to his brother.

“Shoes off. Sit at the table.”

“‘Kay.” Red did just that, kicking his sneakers off and leaving them in the middle of the hall, and shuffled his way to the table.

Edge kicked the shoes towards the wall like they had personally hurt Red and then sat himself in the last chair. Stretch was eyeing Red something fierce, but his expression wasn’t clear enough to tell what he was thinking.

“Hey, Red,” Blue said, though, “Did you finish the repairs?”

“No,” Edge answered for him. Red’s eyelight was trained to the table. He wasn’t blinking. Edge slid a plate of tacos in front of him. “Here, eat.”

“‘Kay,” said Red, though he made no move to do so.

Blue put down his own food in favor of frowning. “Are you alright?”

Edge sighed. “No.”

“Oh…”

Tense silence befell them. Edge tapped Red’s shoulders and repeated his order of, “Eat,” which finally prompted Red to grab one of the tacos and shove it into his mouth, in full.

“He’s dissociating,” Stretch noted, surprising Edge. His expression finally made sense — calculative observation.

“...I am?” Red asked, though the words were barely legible through the food.

“Yes, Sans, you are.”

“‘Kay.”

Edge eyed Stretch suspiciously, crossing his arms and scooting his chair just a little closer to his brother. “How did you know that?”

“Stretch dissociates sometimes,” Blue said, doing nothing to stop the staring match between the two of them, “Though he usually sleeps it off.”

Edge scoffed, quirking a browbone, “You? Isn’t this place all rainbows and sunshine?”

“I reckon even the best place has its dark corners,” Stretch shrugged. “Why don’t you take him upstairs, bro?”

“ _ Don’t. _ ”

Blue chuckled and hopped off his chair. “Come on, Red,” he prompted, “Follow me.”

Red looked between Blue and Edge once, twice, said another, “‘Kay,” and then started shuffling his way up the stairs after Blue. Edge was only stopped from running after them by Stretch’s hand placed on his shoulder.

“It’s fine. Blue’s really good at this stuff, you know. Leave them alone for a bit.”

With an indignant huff, Edge slumped back into his seat. One of his hands came up to rub at this temple and he closed his sockets for a moment. “I don’t leave him alone like this.”

“Yeah, I bet. Blue’s got this, though, I promise. And I hate making promises.”

“Red says that, too,” Edge huffed, the corners of his teeth quirking up the slightest bit. “He’s going to do anything Blue says. What if—” 

“Hey, that’s good. I’ve got an idea. Come with me, I’ll tell you something.”

Edge stared up at the safety railing for a good while while Stretch waited for him by the front door, and then said ‘fuck it,’ to himself and stood up, running a phalange over the leather of his choker. If worse came to worst, Red would let him know.

He hadn’t been inside that long, but the biting wind still startled him somewhat. Not that he could  _ get  _ cold, but he could still feel it. “Where, pray tell, are you taking me?”

“To Muff’s. We’re gonna grab a snack and bring something back for those two,” Stretch told him.

“Muff’s…” Edge echoed, “As in Muffet, huh? You know, I never liked her.”

Somewhere along the way, Stretch had pulled out his pack of smokes and lit one up. Edge refused the outstretched hand with a face of disgust. “What’s she like in your universe?”

“Nasty piece of work. Runs a ‘bakery’ in the Hotland,” Edge told him, “Turns her parlor’s guests into donuts, if I remember correctly.”

Edge made a thoughtful sound, taking a drag of his smoke. “Your place doesn’t sound very nice. Or safe.”

“It isn’t.”

“Is it really worth it to go back to that?”

Edge narrowed his sockets, but Stretch wasn’t looking at him. “It’s home,” he said, simply.

“I know, that’s not what I meant. But sounds like Red wasn’t having much of a good time over there.”

“Are you implying something? Last I heard, you admitted to dissociating just like he does.”

“Eh, the state of my soul is kinda my own fault.”

“Why are you bringing up souls all of a sudden?” 

Stretch took another drag, regarded him with a half-confused, half-suspicious look, and threw the butt into the snow. “Dissociation, lethargy, depression, all of that stuff is, you know, tied to the state of a soul. Please tell me you knew that.”

Edge… had not, in fact, known that.

His lack of an answer must’ve been an answer in itself, but Stretch, thankfully, left it alone. Instead, he stopped in front of what looked like an ice cream parlor from one of the books Edge definitely didn’t make Red read to him when he’d been in stripes. “We’re here. I think you’ll like it.”

* * *

Red turned out to be more manageable than Stretch usually was. It was (probably) mostly because he actually did what Blue told him, unlike his brother, who just laid on his back staring at the ceiling until he passed out.

He had Red sat on his bed and scooted his way as close as he felt was appropriate. Red didn’t move, but he did look at him with an almost glassy look to his eyelight.

“Alright, Red, can you talk to me? Or would you rather stay quiet?”

Red blinked slowly, once, twice. “I c’n talk.”

“Good, that’s good!” Then he caught himself, and added, “Though, there is no wrong here. No matter what you say, it’s not a wrong answer, okay?”

“‘Kay.”

“Good. Do you know what happened? Or would you rather talk about something else?”

Red didn’t answer, not right away. But that was okay, too; Blue had patience in spades (saved up for situations like this) and nothing to do for the rest of the day. “Went t’the lab.”

“Mhm, yeah, we did. Did something happen? Did Undyne say something to you?”

Red curled up into himself, wrapped his arms around himself. “No.”

“Was it bad memories?”

“...no… maybe…” Blue waited, and finally, Red added a quiet, “yeah.”

“It’s just memories, Red. You’re here, now. They can’t get to you.”

Red’s hands fell to his lap. Blue could’ve sworn he was shaking.

“I... killed him. It w’s my fault.”

Blue suppressed a wince. Sure, he had known Red (and Edge) had killed people before, they admitted to it themselves, after all. But this felt different, somewhat. He made sure his voice was as steady as it could be when he asked, “Who did you kill?”

“‘Dings. I j’st…” Red clenched one hand, like he was holding something, and then let it fall slack again. He was crying now, though there were no tears to be found anywhere. “...pumped ‘im fulla DT. ‘n then I… I pushed ‘im inta the lava…” That’s when Red started laughing, low and breathless and so _ obviously _ painful that Blue’s own soul quivered in his ribcage.

He waited until the laughter turned into watery sobs. He didn’t know which had been worse. Or if there even was a better option of the two.

“Do you regret it?”

“Stars… fuck, I do. E’ery fuck’n day.”

“Why did you do it, then?”

Red turned, looked straight at him. Blue had never seen a smile so sad, or so unhinged. “‘cause he asked me ta. Stood there, said ‘ _ m very glad ya understand, Sans _ ,’ ‘n just… he j’st…”

“Come here, Red,” Blue said, spreading his arms. 

“Hugs’re fer weaklings.” Red stared at him like he’d grown a second head, but with another round of scooting, he had his arms wrapped around the bigger skeleton.

“That’s not true. Stay still.” Red went tense in his hold, but he didn’t fight, or pull away. Blue couldn’t imagine a scenario like that. He didn’t know what he would’ve done in Red’s place, but he did know what he needed to say, no matter what his own thoughts were. “It wasn’t your fault. If he asked you to, then you didn’t do anything wrong. It must’ve been what he wanted.”

Red chuckled again, quiet and just on the edge of being manic. “He j’st wanted some peace ‘n quiet at the end. ‘e couldn’t take it ‘nymore.”

“Do you think he has his peace and quiet now?” Blue gently maneuvered Red’s hand from where they hung limply by his sides to rest on his shoulders. Red let him.

“In th’ void? I doubt it. Havin’ yer soul splintered into bajillion pieces and held t’gether by DT t’ power the Core must hurt.”

“He must have had his reasons, Red.  _ It wasn’t your fault _ .”

Red’s arms tightened around his neck, just a fraction. His phalanges dug into his bandana, and he stared into Blue’s eyesockets like he was looking for any sign he was lying. He must’ve found… something, because he went completely lax and slipped out of Blue’s hold.

“Red?”

“Don’t tell ‘nyone ‘bout this.”

Blue cracked a smile, breathing out a small huff. “It’s okay, you know. Everyone has their moments.”

Red scoffed and rolled his eyelight. He seemed to be himself again, which was a relief, at least. “I’ve got a reputation t’keep, shrimp.”

“Do you? Last I checked, almost no one here knows you!”

Red actually paused at that, staring out of the window like he was frozen. “Don’t tell Edge what I told ya.”

“Alright, I won’t.” He wanted to say it might be good to tell him, but now wasn’t the time, nor place. 

“Good.” Red hopped off his bed, paused again, and looked at Blue with a mixture of embarrassment and annoyance? Maybe? “...thanks.”

Blue beamed at him, “It’s no problem!”

* * *

As soon as they entered the café, Edge thought he was seeing things. Everything was so bright, and there was so much purple everywhere.

“Hey, Muff!”

“Oh! Hello, darling! I haven’t seen you here in a while! Must’ve been at least five hours!” Muffet chuckled, and Edge couldn’t stop staring at her. Dressed in an admittedly pretty dapper romper, her tie tucked into it, carrying two trays of cakes, two of drinks, using the last two arms to hug Stretch, and all of that while on roller-skates, of all things.

She couldn’t be further from the Muffet Edge knew. No lace to be found anywhere, no venomous glares, and no being tied up in her web.

“Fell asleep,” Stretch said, with a wink.

“Ahuhu! Sure, sure, whatever you say, darling. Now, go sit yourselves at one of the booths, I’ll be right with you!”

She rolled her way around the café then, placing and taking trays as she went, all so effortlessly Edge was actually reminded of a dance. Stretch tugged him towards one of the tables, so he tore his eyelights away from her and sat down.

“So, what d’you think? Pretty neat, isn’t it?”

“It certainly is… something,” Edge deadpanned. Not even a full minute passed before Muffet was standing at their table, holding a pen and notebook in one pair of hands, the others on her hips. 

“Alright, what can I get you two? I’m assuming the usual for you, Pap? Who’s your friend, anyway? I haven’t seen any skeletons apart from you and Sans before!” She was upbeat, and not even Edge’s glum look could stop that.

“Long story, Muff. His name’s Edge, because he’s so edgy.”

Muffler laughed, but had the decency to hide her mouth with one hand. Didn’t detract from the fact that she  _ was  _ laughing, and Edge was going to strangle Stretch the very next chance he got.

“Pleased to meet you, Edge!” Muffet said, offering one of her hands. Edge stared at it for a second before it clicked she was expecting a  _ handshake _ . People in this universe were truly just begging to be hurt. But, since Edge was Great and Terrible  _ and  _ knew his manners (even if they didn’t align with these people’s), he took the hand and shook it. Maybe with too much force, but that was besides the point.

“Likewise.”

“Oh, how proper!” she tutted, and Edge was so very close to outright  _ preening  _ at the compliment that even Stretch snorted. “So, what’ll it be? Are you also a…  _ fan  _ of honey?” She threw a look at Stretch when she said the word ‘fan,’ and Edge pulled a grimace.

“Stars no. I’ll have water.”

“And three croissants,” Stretch interjected. “Pack two of them for the road, please? For our bros.”

“Got it, got it. And, let me guess, you want me to put it on your tab?”

“Oh, you know me so well, Muff.”

Muffet shook her head and skated her way to the counter without another word. Edge watched her, because seeing her move around the place, all six arms doing something completely different while still somehow in sync was almost hypnotizing. She pulled the display case open and reached into it — there was so much food in there alone, not even counting the lineup of bottles on the shelves behind her. How did they have so much food? Edge couldn’t wrap his mind around it. Maybe that was why they were all so wasteful with it — pulled out crescent-shaped somethings, and did something beneath the counter that Edge couldn’t see.

Moments later, she was skating back towards them, passing another booth on the way and leaving one of the trays there. All while not stopping. Edge wondered if she’d be just as fluid during a fight. He didn’t dwell on it.

“Here ya go, darlings,” she announced, playing a tray before each of them, and then grabbed a glass of water that Edge had asked for, and a bottle of honey for Stretch. Edge shuddered just looking at it — he’d had honey only once before, and promptly said it was also the last time. Last thing she left was a paper bag. “Enjoy!”

When Muffet was gone and Edge had taken a gulp of his (non-polluted, clear, refreshing) water, he turned his full attention towards Stretch. “You said you had something to say.”

“Hm? Oh yeah. Blue’s great with his mouth and—”

“Disgusting.”

“Huh? What— Oh! That’s not how I meant that, and you know it.”

Edge leveled him with a flat look that somehow conveyed his hope, and Stretch rolled his eyelights. “Blue’s great with his  _ words _ ,” he corrected, “and when we come back, they’ll be in the living room watching Napstaton. Bet.”

“I have no clue what Napstaton is, but if I find anything wrong with Red, your brother’s lifespan will be considerably shortened.”

“I see you don’t believe me. But Blue’s been dealing with my shit for years.”

“And  _ I _ still don’t see how someone like you could possibly have the same problem as my brother.”

“It’s probably not the same, but symptoms of various things can be similar.”

Edge raised a browbone, “Elaborate.”

“Nah, I don’t think we’re close enough for me to spill my soul to you,” Stretch said, with an entirely unnecessary wink at the end. Ew. Edge decided he no longer cared. “But if you wanna share something, I’m the number one best listener in the Underground. According to Blue.”

“I don’t think we’re close enough for me to spill my soul to you,” Edge threw back, and it made Stretch howl with laughter.

“Touché! Well, we can deal with anything else when it comes up. Now, tell me what you think of Muff’s croissants!”

As far as topic changers, it was awful, but Edge rolled with it (and so did his eyelights). He took the croissant and bit off a piece, tasting the flavor before it got converted into pure magic. He expected something similar to Blue’s cooking, so his sockets went wide.

It was… great.

Buttery and flaky, and he almost couldn’t taste any intent in it.

Stretch grinned lopsidedly as he sipped on his honey. “See, I knew you’d like it!”

“It’s… good,” Edge said. He resisted the urge to eat the whole thing in one go and paced himself instead.

“Do you think Red will like it?”

Definitely. It tasted great and his brother deserved better than the stupid rations that were forced on them, or Blue’s cloying meat. “Most probably.”

“Cool. We can head back when we’re done then.”

And that was the only motivation that Edge needed to swallow the rest of the pastry in one go. He was still waiting on that ‘clear,’ from Red, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> were slowly, slowly getting to the actual romance part, haha! i always said im bad at writing slow burns, but this is probably the longest ive ever held out in a story until now


	15. blue cannot, for the life of him, stay asleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which red accomplishes... absolutely nothing!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no tws in this chapter as far as i can tell, but please lmk if i overlooked something♥

When they got back, Stretch’s self-satisfied grin was just begging for a punch. Red and Blue were sitting on the couch, with the TV blaring some horrendous music, which Red was loudly commenting on; just like Stretch had said.

“It’s j’st not got ‘nough flames ‘n death!”

“Honestly, Napstaton is _the_ number one celebrity! Everyone loves them!”

“They got nothin’ on Mettaton! Oh, hey bro, where’d ya go?”

Red leaned over the armrest and grinned at him lazily. He looked, for all intents and purposes… okay.

"We—" 

“We went to Muff’s,” Stretch said, holding up the paper bag, “Brought you guys some croissants, too.”

"I would appreciate it if you did not answer for me." Stretch just shrugged, in that nonchalant way that Edge was begrudgingly getting used to. 

Blue pulled a grimace and folded his arms. “Ugh, Muff’s again… I don’t understand how you like it there.”

“It seemed like a… nice place,” Edge shrugged, much to Stretch’s amusement. “Red?”

Red’s grin never left his face, and it didn’t look forced. Maybe it was on purpose, because it was calming Edge down. “Clear, bro,” he said, without even being prompted.

All the tension gathered in Edge's whole being dissipated all at once. Tersely, he nodded. Red chuffed a laugh and turned back to the TV. The cyan-haired robot had just broken into another song on their floating… spinny disks. Whatever the hell those were.

"In that case I'm retiring for the night."

“Night, bro.”

"Good night!" Blue called after him, not even looking away from the screen. He launched himself into another tirade about how cool Napstaton was; Red’s comments were just heating him up further.

Stretch threw himself onto the couch, landing over Blue’s legs and halfway over Red’s. “What the fuck!”

“Yo.”

“Get the hell offa me!”

“Red, language,” Blue chided, “And Stretch, sit like a normal monster.”

Stretch sighed, as theatrically as he could, and finally scooted himself next to Blue, passing over the paper bag in the process. “You’re both killjoys.”

"No, y'just don't know what a fuck'n personal space is."

"Honestly, Red, your language is even worse than Papy's."

Red made a non-committal noise, rolling his eyelights. He was handed one of the croissants, and was content stuffing his mouth with it, if only for the fact that he hadn't eaten since lunchtime.

It was surprisingly good, and in no time at all, he’d chewed through the whole thing, so Blue handed him the other one as well, saying, “You can have mine as well. I don’t like them that much.”

“Yer loss, sweetcheeks,” Red said, snatching it up. 

“Honestly, your loss, bro.” Being backed by someone who wasn’t his own brother was new and weird, but Red shrugged it off. The strange, pleasant feeling in his soul wasn’t that important.

The buzz of the TV and the brothers’ chatter faded into the background as Red let himself relax, staring at the screen without really processing whatever the robot DJ was doing. Time passed him by in a hazy, but not unpleasant, blur, and he only caught himself zoning out when the scenery outside the window had turned dark, and the TV was the only light in the room.

Blue and Stretch had fallen asleep — Stretch leaned against the corner and Blue curled up against his side. There wasn’t a shred of tenseness in either of them, and Red found himself slightly, just slightly envious. Sure, he loved to take naps, but his sleep was always light, and he was always ready to jump awake at a moment’s notice.

Out of some sort of courtesy, he tried his best to be quiet as he stood up and stretched. Sure, he could go ahead and sleep as well, but he’d lost more time that he could’ve used to repair the machine, again. Why not use the downtime to finally fix his mess? He could sleep when they got home, on his shitty, stained mattress.

Man, did that ever sound more appealing than right now.

“Mm… Red?”

Red paused on his way to the door, turning his head to look back. Blue was rubbing at his eyesocket, blearily looking at him with the other one. 

“Where are you going?”

Red’s ever-present grin stretched further, and he shoved his hands into his pockets. “Down t’ the basement. Go back t’sleep, sweetheart.”

Blue blinked at him, quiet, before his skull lit up like a god-damn Gyftmas tree, blue glow almost as bright as the flickering TV. 

“You uh… y’okay there?” Red asked, browbones furrowing. “Feelin’ sick?”

“No! No, I’m fine!” Blue rebutted. Red glanced over at Stretch, sure his brother’s volume would wake him up, but the taller skeleton didn’t budge an inch, perfectly content as his head lolled back against the cushions. Blue didn’t really _look_ fine, but who the hell knew, this might’ve been normal for him. Red didn’t feel inclined to shove his nasal aperture in his business.

“A’ight, whatever ya say, sweetheart.”

Blue made a soft sound, much to Red’s suspicious look, but he composed himself rather quickly. “Mind if I come with?”

Red shrugged, “Why not.”

And that’s how they found themselves in the basement, where Red surveyed the mess he’d created. Sure, a lot of the wiring had been done, but the colored wires were tangled in an awful mess that’d have ‘Dings rolling in his grave, if he had one. Begrudgingly, he sat down and started on making sense of his own work.

Blue sat himself on the edge of the table (after wiping away the dust), and watched as Red untwisted some of the wires, plugged them all back in correctly, and set to winding new ones together into colorful spirals. It made a weird concoction of comfort and melancholy surge within his soul, like he was back in the lab in the early morning, doing last-minute checks before they began testing some new equipment. 

“You must be really smart to understand all these wires and… technical stuff,” Blue mumbled. He’d taken to twisting a forgotten pair of pliers in his fingers, opening and closing them idly.

Red shrugged, plugged the wires into a connector, and taped it together. “Used ta be into this shit, y’know. B’t then ‘Dings died, ‘n I was done with science. I mean, look what happened when I came back ta it.”

“What? You discovered other universes exist and physically went to one? I think that’s pretty cool. Undyne was really impressed, too!”

‘Cool.’ Heh, Blue was an idiot. But he probably meant well, there was no reason for Red to blow a casket. “Ain’t nothin’ cool about it, darlin’.”

“Why do you do that?”

Red looked up, for a moment, fingers flicking a couple switches to see if he’d been connecting parts correctly. “Do wha’?”

“Calling me, well… sweetheart, mostly?”

Red blinked, outstretched hand stopping midair. Had he? Thinking back, yeah, sure, he’d slipped back into the habit. “Call everyone that, sweetcheeks. Don’ think yer special.” As long as he isn’t on the verge of a breakdown, apparently. Whatever.

“Alright.” That seemed to end that line of a conversation, as Blue returned to playing with the pliers, but still watching Red’s hands with avid interest.

The silence was punctuated only by the shuffling of papers as Red peered at the messy lines, his notes in the margins, and the clattering as the contents of the box diminished little by little.

“Papy loves science,” Blue said, slightly out of the blue. Heh. “He acts like he doesn’t, but he told me he wants to be an uh… astropi-phycisisist?”

“Astrophysicist?” Red supplied, quirking a browbone. His grip on the screwdriver tightened, and he screwed the connector in with a bit too much force than was strictly necessary.

“Yeah, like studying the stars, and space! But I think he’s given up on it… He doesn’t think we’ll ever get out of the Underground.”

Red stayed quiet. He’d had a dream like that, but there was no escape from the Underground, not in his universe and not in any other. The barrier was just too strong. They weren’t able to come up with a way to get through it, and if ‘Dings hadn’t figured it out, there was no one who could.

“That’s why I want to become part of the Royal guard. If I could capture a human, we’d finally have all seven souls, and Queen Toriel could become a god. She could shatter the barrier. And Papy would be able to do what he always wanted.”

Red tightened the protective plate on the back and started winding wires around the display’s connecting board, but something was welling inside of him. Something he couldn’t place. “What’s human souls gotta do with the barrier?” he asked, softer than he’d intended.

“It’s the prophecy. If a power equal to the mages who trapped us in here, so seven human souls, is unleashed on the barrier, it can be overpowered. The Queen has gathered six so far, but… no human has come here in a long time.”

Red attached the display to its holder and flicked a switch to test it. It lit up in a rainbow-colored haze, and then turned black, with only a green cursor flickering in the top left. Pressing a couple buttons let him know everything was mapped properly.

He didn’t know how to feel about what Blue just told him. He didn’t know what ‘prophecy’ the shrimp was talking about, and using human souls on the barrier…

Well, it didn’t sound _impossible_ . Seven human souls combined with a monster that could use them, versus a spell cast by seven humans centuries ago… It would check out. An attack by such a creature, maybe at a seventy degree angle, would just _maybe_ be enough to scatter it. Or it would bounce back and destroy the castle. One of the two, probably. He didn’t have the energy to run any calculations to see the probabilities.

They’d never known about that, and the idea didn’t even occur to them. ‘Dings had tried to experiment on DT, but he’d stopped when their funding was cut. And when he figured out how he could get out of His Majesty’s claws.

The idea that they might’ve been close, so close, to getting out of the Underground… he wasn’t sure how to deal with the knowledge. So he didn’t, instead just focusing on the network of wires sticking out of an exposed panel. He threw the fried ones away into the growing pile and replaced them with new ones, going through the tape like there was no tomorrow.

A new stretch of silence befell the room. Red finished taping together the last connector; though it looked like a tangled, multicolored mutilation, when he plugged it in, it worked.

With that, all he had to do was reset the internal clock and plug everything into power all at once. Excitement ran through his marrow, and he might've mistyped the resetting command a couple times before he finally got it right and the screen shut itself off.

Blue had fallen asleep again, sprawled back on the table, but it wasn't surprising. If he'd fallen asleep once, he must've been tired. Red plugged all the power supply cables into their connector box, and then plugged that into the wall socket.

Everything buzzed to life and the screen of the machine greeted him with a prompt for coordinates. He did it. He fixed this machine once, and now he'd done it again. Pride welled in his soul, and for once, it was strong enough to overpower even his guilt and self-loathing.

The coordinates felt like they were branded into his non-existent brain. 0639. He had chosen it at random, fingers slick with Edge's marrow hitting random keys in his panic to get them back to the morning, but he didn't think he could ever forget it. He typed then in, the machine took them, sputtered softly, made a concerning noise from its bowels as the power and generators worked overtime, and then, like magic itself had a hand in it, a portal appeared on the wall next to the machine, blue and orange that bled together in a facsimile of a setting sun.

He stood there for a moment, almost shocked at himself, before his feet moved. The portal emitted a low buzzing, louder and louder the closer he got to it.

He reached out with a hand, so close to touching the swirling energy. He was so close. So close to home.

And was pulled back.

He whipped around to find Blue holding him back by his jacket, looking almost exactly the same as he had when Red decided to come downstairs. “Let go,” he hissed. It was quiet over the sound of the portal.

Blue did not let go. “Um… are you sure about it? It might be dangerous. To go alone, I mean.”

“‘m not letting Paps through b’fore I see if it works. Now let go, shrimp.”

“What if you get stranded again?”

“The machine on our side is fixed, I ain’t gettin’ stranded again.”

“I still think it’s dangerous to go alone.”

“What, y’volunteerin’ to come with?”

That got Blue to let go, and also take a couple steps backwards. He was eyeing the portal with obvious apprehension. “No, I just… I can’t stop you anyways, just… be careful?”

Red scoffed, like an instinct. He was always careful, you couldn’t afford not to, not back home. He’d pop in, check if it was _their_ basement (or wherever he ended up), and then return to bring Paps with him.

He took the last step towards the portal and, with nothing to hold him back, walked into the surface of the energy. The buzzing got almost deafening, but it only lasted for a moment before it got back to its manageable level. His body felt sluggish, while simultaneously energized by the trip.

Red was back in the basement, with tools strewn across the floor, with stacks of scribbled papers haphazardly shuffled between them, with a soft lightbulb abovehead. 

And in the middle of it, looking completely stunned and watching him with wavering eyelights, stood Blue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyways im sorry for the wait. i got the plotline figured out, but i was held up writing self-indulgent stuff haha. next up, we deal with the whole coordinates thing


	16. sometimes all you needs is words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which red realizes something he shouldve years ago

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws for this chapter include; violence, blood and hysteria

Red’s confusion lasted for all of two seconds, before the situation hit him with the force of a freight train. He turned to the machine while his soul took a plummet down his chest cavity. Could the speed of it deplete his HP? He didn’t know and, frankly, he didn’t care.

The machine sputtered its way on, display proudly showcasing the coordinates he’d fed it.

0639.

Cold dread seized his bones. The coordinates were right. 

And they led  _ here _ .

It wasn’t a two-way street.

He wasn’t sure if he wanted to scream, cry, or turn the machine into a billion pieces of scrap metal all over again. What he ended up doing was laughing. His chuckle developed into a full-blown laughter, bouncing between the bare walls.

Blue watched on with a conflicted look on his face. There wasn’t a shred of joy in the sound, nor was it the taunting tone he sometimes turned onto Alphys during their spars. It rang hollow, and tugged at Blue’s soul ever harder when it started becoming punctuated by wheezing intakes of air and… dare he say…? sobs.

“Red?” he called out, unsure where he was even going with this. All he knew was that Red, right now, looked like his brother, and he didn’t like that.

Red turned to him, his laughter fading off in tandem to his shoulders sagging. “‘s funny, ain’t it?”

“What do you mean?”

“It don’t work. I fucked up. It  _ won’t _ work. An’ ain’t that jus’ fuck’n  _ hilarious _ ?”

“Whatever happened, I’m sure you can fix it.”

Red looked him up and down, before he barked out another laugh. This time it wasn’t as disturbing as when it had lasted for a full minute, but it still sounded the same. “Y’don’ get it, sweetcheeks. Oh, y’don’  _ get _ it!” He paused for another chuckle, gripping the front of his shirt as he gasped to replace his breath. “Oh, tha’s hilarious. All a this’s hilarious!”

“Red... are you having another attack? You are, aren’t you?”

“Am I? Heh! Why wouldn’t I be?” He reached over and grabbed Blue by on his wrists to yank him towards the machine. “Lemme ‘xplain it ta ya! See, there ain’t nothin’  _ ta _ fix! The machine’s fine!”

Red’s fingers, gripping Blue tight enough to almost bruise his bone, were shaking. He wasn’t sure if staying quiet during Red’s bursts of laughs was the right thing to do, but he still didn’t know what to say.

“So, y’give it coordinates, right? An’ they open a portal. Followin’, sweetheart? Now, I gave  _ my _ machine these here coordinates,” Red explained, motioning with his other hand towards the display, “an’ it spat us here! So— y’know, I thought it’d be like a corridor. Like a… tunnel! Oh, heheh! That’s fuck’n hilarious, I’m so goddamn stupid! I don’ fuck’n have the coordinates fer our world! Only yers! I can’t get us back!”

Red devolved into more chuckles, muttering to himself about how ‘hilarious’ this whole situation was. Blue didn’t find it funny at all.

“Red,” he said, as sternly as he allowed himself.

It garnered Red’s attention. The eyelights staring not at him, but through him, were frayed along their crimson edges.

“From what you told me, your universe doesn’t sound particularly nice. Are you sure you really want to go back there?”

His words seemed to startle Red out of his little episode, only for him to let out what was  _ decidedly  _ a growl and take up a stance that had Blue tensing, almost, almost expecting to be pulled into an encounter. “What’re ya talkin’ about, shrimp. It’s our life.”

He did his best to appear non-threatening, which was a wild idea and a half, standing before a monster who was obviously stronger and more threatening than he ever could be (as embarrassing as that was to admit). “I know. I know that, but why go back to a life that didn’t treat you well? You are welcome here, you know.”

Red’s browbones drew together into a frown, so tight that Blue wondered if he’d be stuck that way forever. Probably not, they were made of magic, after all. Red’s voice went lower than Blue had ever heard it as he said, “I’ll never leave Paps alone. Never.”

“Red…” Blue sighed, looking past Red’s shoulder at the still-swirling portal. “I don’t think I worded that very well. You and Edge are  _ both _ welcome here.”

Red’s tense posture relaxed the slightest bit, the magic that had been lurking around him like a sleeping dog, ready to be unleashed, dimmed with only the smell of ozone to mark its existence. He didn’t say anything, just studied Blue’s face, like there was a hidden meaning to his words, or like he was waiting for Blue to take them back.

“I’m not saying I’m gonna hold you here.” Blue chuffed a laugh, “I don’t think I really could. it It just didn't really sound like you enjoyed living there.’

Red deflated like a loosely-tied balloon, leaning against the edge of the machine. “It don’t matter what I enjoy. I ain’t sacrificin’ everythin’ Edge worked so hard fer.”

“Just think about it, okay? We can look for the right coordinates in the meantime. Maybe Undyne could help!”

Red refused to meet his gaze and, after a moment of silence, he just flicked the switches to turn the machine off. “Hey shrimp,” he said, frowning down at the floor. He wasn’t happy with the current situation — no part of it. He wasn’t used to it, wasn’t used to solving his hysterics with nothing but some (grossly) nice words.

“Yeah?”

The words were on the tip of his metaphorical tongue, but he hesitated. “Yer good at this.”

Blue crossed his arms over his ribcage and stood just a little straighter. Even like that, he still wasn’t taller than Red. “The Magnificent Blue is the best, actually,” he stated, with no room for debate, “And you’re welcome.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m gonna head t’bed.”

“Oh, alright. It is getting pretty la—” 

He probably should’ve felt bad about leaving before Blue finished his thought, but he was suddenly tired. And he didn’t think he could stand any more of Blue’s… kindness, was it? He didn’t like the way it was able to calm him. What he wanted was to get into an argument with his brother and maybe get hit by a couple bones he doesn’t notice.

Blue’s room was dark and quiet, only lighting up for half a second as Red reappeared in the middle of it. Edge sat on the bed, exactly as awake as Red had expected him to be. Their eyelights met, and all Red could feel was an overwhelming sense of disappointment. At himself, always at himself.

“Hey, bro.”

“Ready to stop bullshitting me?”

Red flinched as if he had been physically struck, though Edge would never do that. It took an embarrassingly long moment of panic to realize he probably meant his  _ earlier  _ breakdown, and wasn’t that another abso-fucking-lutely hilarious thing, that he had so many of them. He might as well start numbering them. What was he, a numb-skulled babybones again?

“Well?”

He should’ve rolled with it. He should’ve explained that him and Blue had talked, and that the infuriating copy of himself had wrangled his panic into submission. Twice. This was his brother, for stars’ sake! If he couldn’t trust his brother, what did he have left?

“Yeah, sure,” he conceded, eventually. Edge stared at him expectantly, tapping a finger against his humerus with clock-like timing. “But not here.”

He grabbed one of Edge’s hands and took another shortcut, putting them outside, into the small clearing. The light in the living room was still off, but so was the TV, from what he could see through the window. Good.

Red let go of Edge as his brother voiced his avid distaste with teleportation, and took a couple steps back. His fingers flexed, once, twice, and on the third curl, he had a jagged, crimson bone in his grip. His legs parted just enough for him to have a solid foothold, crunching snow underneath his soles.

Edge stood where he’d left him, staring at him, gauging his intent. He wasn’t sure there was any intent to  _ be  _ gauged. Yet. “I fixed th’ machine,” he said.

“That’s good.” Edge made no move to start the battle; he didn’t even summon a construct. Red’s eyelights fell to the ground.

“We can’t use it.”

Edge took a single, resolute step forward. There was still no bone construct in his gloved hand, but Red tensed up anyway, his hand twitching as if to bring his bone up as a shield, though he stopped it. “Why?”

There was nothing but the artificial wind and the rustling of pine trees for a moment. “I ain’t know the coordinates back ta our place.”

Edge’s browbones furrowed and he placed his hands onto his hips. “Okay? So figure them out.”

“Can’t.”

Since Edge was obviously not going to take the opening for the first strike, Red took the opportunity himself. His free hand flew out of his pocket and, with it, a line of bones cracked the half-frozen layer of snow, aimed for Edge.

“Elaborate,” Edge demanded, sidestepping the attack as he — finally — summoned a blade of his own.

“T’get anywhere, y’need specific coordinates,” Red said, taking a deep breath that might have had his rib cage rattling. If it did, no one but him knew. He flickered in and out of the void, all too predictable in his first strike as he reappeared behind Edge, slashing in a wide arc.

Edge parried him, simply rotating on a heel.

Red laid a trap of bones behind his brother. The sparks between their constructs ebbed, until they were just pushing against each other with no real strength behind it. “I ain’t know ours, only the ones ta get here. An’ I…” Red’s teeth grit into a grimace and he pushed down, yanking Edge’s construct out of his grip. 

Fuck, fuck, fuck! Anger welled inside him, battling with his inwards-aimed fury, which made for an interesting combination. It always felt like an LV rush, but somehow less muddled. This battle was not going how he wanted it to! Why was he able to disarm his brother so easily! Why was Edge stepping back, right into the trap?! 

“Fuck’n! Stop!” Red grit out, turning his soul blue and holding him still before his boot could snag on one of those tiny bones blended into the snow. His hand, outstretched as it was, shook. Edge stared at him, summoning another bone. “I can’t… find out ours,” he admitted, “Not, fuck’n! Not without fuck’n trial-n-error, an’ as soon as the fuck’n machine on th’ other side ain’t fixed, it’s square fuck’n one all over again!”

Edge didn’t reply. He stayed rooted to the spot with Red’s magic, even though he could’ve used his own to free himself. All he did was flick his wrist and strike forward with his bone. The crimson construct slashed at his brother’s outstretched arm, burrowing into it.

Red hissed through his teeth, recoiling his hand and losing his hold on Edge’s soul. Marrow dripped down onto the snow, and Red’s HP was down to two. His brother’s weapon was gone the next time he looked up, and he was pulled closer by his half-severed arm. Heh, more marrow to stain his jacket.

He was close to giggling as he watched the crimson seep into the red fabric, only barely making it darker. Edge’s demand of, “Clear?” was almost completely missed.

“Heh. Clear,” Red muttered, glancing away as his brother pulled the tattered sleeve up and over the wound. “Still got two whole points ta spare. Woo.”

“Not for long,” Edge said, wording it like a threat while his hand lit up with green and he pushed healing magic into the wound. Red relaxed, until Edge’s eyelights met his. “I asked if you were clear.”

“I a’ready said I was, Paps.”

“And _ I _ said no more bullshit. Are. You. Clear?”

Red grimaced and pulled his sleeve back down when Edge was done. There was nothing but the faintest of lines to indicate he’d even been hurt. Just one more among however-the-fuck many.

“Clear as a used fuck’n cup,” he muttered. His shoulders sagged and he shoved his hands into the pockets of his ruined jacket.

Edge took a deep breath, frowning at him with an intensity of the entire Core for a moment. Then there was a subtle change that Red looked away from. Loving someone was a weakness. He didn’t care about having one; hell, he had so many of them, what was another one, right? But Edge… he didn’t need a useless brother to care about and bring him down. Someone, eventually, would get to him, and he wouldn’t be fast enough, strong enough, and it’d only hurt Edge, and— 

They weren’t back home. But getting used to something would only make it that much harder to get  _ un _ -used to it. He refused to acknowledge Edge’s care, but wasn’t that the reason he’d dragged his brother out here?

“I’m absolutely appalled,” Edge stated, and all Red could do was grin, sockets falling closed.

“I ain’t blame ya.”

“Let me finish, you numb-skull. I am appalled you would think I would, what? Hurt you? Dust you? What did you think, Sans?”

Red winced, already unused to hearing his own name, and refused to look anywhere near Edge’s face. “Dunno. I j’st… fuck’n… I ain’t been nothin’ but a damned nuisance, fuckin’ up left ‘n right.”

Edge growled, “I’m  _ going _ to dust you if you don’t shut up.”

Red’s teeth snapped shut. Edge wouldn’t do it, but this was familiar. This was safe.

“If I hear you blaming yourself for any of this, I’m dusting you. If I see you beating yourself up over the machine again, I’m dusting you. And if you ever try to use me to harm yourself again, I will grind your dust into nothing and flush it down the damned toilet.”

Edge’s voice had been low and threatening, but Red only relaxed. This was a shred of normalcy, and he clung to each and every word. “That a promise, bro?”

His brother’s eyelights sparked, and his teeth pulled up into a wide grin that could rival Red’s. “Wouldn’t you like to find out?”

He wanted to push, taunt with a ‘yep,’ but he already felt better, and that was enough for him. “‘m sorry.”

“Save your apologies, brother, they aren’t needed. Just remember what I told you.”

Edge led them back inside, and Red only fell in step with him because that’s what he always did, always followed his brother’s lead. The snow crunched under their feet.

“And the machine… you’ll figure it out, I know that. And even if you don’t, we will survive. We always do.”

Red’s fingers, curled into fists inside his pockets, trembled. He pretended Edge’s words weren’t as soft as they were, and he pretended he couldn’t see the care in them. He pretended he was the only one who cared about his brother, because that was easier. He pretended the collar around his neck was just for show, that the protective intent in it was staged.

But it was impossible to ignore the concerned look Edge was giving him over his shoulder. It was dawning on him that he had been fucking Edge over for a very, very long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i looked at the hit count, blacked out and posted this. love yall


	17. midnight mending and mind-bogglery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which edge is a good brother and red just can't stop staring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i realize its been ages since the last chapter but in my defense i have depression and the whole 'dark at 3pm' thing hits hard, man. enjoy♥
> 
> no tws for this chapter. mentioned living on the streets

Red had always possessed the innate ability to fall asleep anywhere, anytime. So when they finally made their way to their (borrowed) room, he just fell atop the bed and was immediately out.

Edge never shared this ability, but that was fine. He sat himself at the desk, eyelights rowing over the action figures lined up on it. It reminded him of his own collection, though Blue seemed to have more of them. Edge used his as stand-ins for creating plans whenever he was assigned a particularly difficult task by Undyne, or when he had decided to rope his brother into making battle strategies that made use of both of their strengths and accounted for their weaknesses; he wasn't sure what his brother's double used these for. Maybe mock battles as well? 

A thought for later, perhaps.

He picked one up, a tiny, caped soldier who, upon closer inspection, was hand-painted. The paint job was less than stellar, one of the eyes went all the way down the face, but it still didn’t look _bad_. The stained cup with a couple paint brushes off to the corner of the table told him that Blue himself had painted these.

He set the little soldier back down, and had to stifle a sigh. 

Everything about this universe was soft. Just the idea of having the time to sit down, get paint and paint little miniatures, without having to worry about someone breaking into the house, or kidnapping your brother, or dusting any of the very small number of people you could trust even the tiniest bit was… Edge wasn’t sure he knew how he was feeling when he thought about it. 

Idly, he started looking through the desk drawers. He wasn’t sure if it was to occupy his mind or hurt himself more with yet more reminders of how shitty their world was. In one of the drawers sat a sewing kit, a clear plastic box with needles and thread and little patches of — floral, or all things — fabric.

Edge glanced over at his brother, who was snoring in a nest he’d made by kicking the blanket around. Red was the older brother, who had had to go through much more shit than Edge ever did, and if he was unhappy with the hand they’d been dealt, how must’ve Red felt?

Wait, _was_ he unhappy?

Browbones scrunched, he stood up and walked over to his brother. The only time Red didn’t have a scowl etched into his features was when he made one of his awful jokes, or when he was sleeping. For a moment, Edge wished he could see more of such peaceful expressions, but then he remembered that he probably wasn’t much different. A Royal Guardsman has to strike fear into the souls of monsters, after all.

Gentler than he’d admit, he pulled Red up into a sit. It was a wonder and a half that his brother didn’t wake up, but he was used to Edge moving him in his sleep. Finding him dozing on the couch standing watch until Edge returned from work, snoring like a little puppy waiting to be culled at his post… he probably wasn’t phased if it was Edge moving him anymore.

He wrestled the filthy excuse of a hoodie off his brother and set him back down. He cast the crimson article of clothing a scathing look before he returned to the table with it. The plastic box made a pathetic little sound when he opened it, but it did open nonetheless.

Sure, he wasn’t the best at sewing (or anything, as some monsters liked to remind him before they were dusted), but it only took him half a dozen tries to thread the needle and set to work. One after another he mended the holes in the hoodie. One, at the front left side, was so big he had to sew in one of the little fabric squares. He just hoped Red wouldn’t mind too much. He even took the time to find one that was _not_ _so_ terribly floral! It still escaped his grasp why they were all patterned with flowers, but the one he picked was black, with only tiny red roses, and only a couple were visible after he was done with the hole anyways.

As satisfied with his work as he could be, he took the hoodie over to the adjacent bathroom, all the while pointlessly trying to unkink the fur at the hood. How his brother could walk around with a marrow-stained hoodie was beyond him.

Maybe, if their world, their universe, was like this one, the hoodie wouldn’t get destroyed again. His brother wouldn’t need to shut down his thinking to do his job, to keep them both alive and deserving rations. 

As he washed the hoodie under a stream of running water in the sink — a thing that wouldn’t happen in their world — he tried to think back to the last time he’d seen Red happy. His brother was always on edge, vigilant despite his projected nonchalance, nervous, or breaking down. From time to time, mostly in battles, he’d look like a complete lunatic to onlookers, grinning and laughing and taunting his enemies madly. But none of that was happiness.

Edge wasn’t sure when the last _he_ himself felt it.

The water swirling down the drain eventually ran clear, no longer clouded with red, and he softly wrung the hoodie out, like it would fall apart in his hands if he didn’t. It was stupid.

He threw it over the back of the chair and sat himself back down, once again faced with the army of tiny figurines. They were almost taunting him, a symbol of something he could never have.

And it was thanks to those little, stupid miniatures, that he realized that despite his dream of joining the Royal Guard coming true, he just… wasn’t satisfied. He had never been happy with their circumstances. Becoming a Royal Guard hadn’t changed their life; Red was still called to the palace, they still received weekly rations, they still paid gold for anything they needed. Maybe… Maybe under different circumstances, their whole Underground could’ve been like this one, a place where the rule of kill-or-be-killed didn’t apply, a place where monsters could trust each other, and be… happy.

Edge’s eyelights were drawn to his brother again, and the (gross) little line of spit rolling from the corner of his teeth.

Their world wasn’t nice. Their world wasn’t fair. After all, what world forces a _little kid_ to gain LV, just to survive? It wasn’t good, and without a fool-proof plan, or an army of allies, there was no way to change it.

So maybe, just maybe, it had been a blessing in disguise that they ended up here, in a world Edge never could’ve imagined even being possible. 

The more he thought about it, the less he wanted to return to his hard-earned place in a world built upon the suffering of everyone. If there was a chance for them to be happy — if there was a chance for his brother to be happy — here, then… maybe, just maybe…

They shouldn’t return.

* * *

Red awoke to an empty room, with the sun barely making its way above the horizon. His skull pounded with a headache, but that was par for the course, so he didn’t pay it much attention.

Getting up and stretching to pop his stiff joints, he discovered he wasn’t wearing his hoodie, despite the few blurry memories of coming back inside not giving him any hint of ever taking it off. A moment later, he found it draped over the backrest of the chair, suspiciously clean. He held it up, the crimson color more vibrant now that it wasn’t caked in a layer of grime and marrow, and when he examined it closer, he noticed all the little tears and rips mended.

He’d barely been up for five minutes and he was already feeling overwhelmed. He shrugged the hoodie on while patting down a patch of fur that dried in a weird position. Edge must’ve washed and fixed it while he slept.

Sure, the rest of his outfit was borrowed, but he still felt leagues better now that his hoodie wasn’t just a glorified scrap of cloth. Maybe it was Edge’s way of telling him he really wasn’t angry. He knew how much it meant to Red, after all.

Feeling more like himself than he had for days, he emerged out of Blue’s room and made his way down the stairs, hands in pockets, phalanges running over the softened fabric there like it would disappear on him.

Edge was in the kitchen, and so was Blue. Stretch was nowhere to be seen, but judging by the fact that the fake sun was barely up, he was probably still sleeping. 

“—so you just think about the food itself,” he heard Edge say. They were probably cooking then. “Not about it tasting good, just the food itself. The less intent there is, the better it tastes. It’s kind of weird.”

 _Oh, sweet_ , Red thought. He was teaching Blue how not to suffocate people with food intent. “Yo.”

Blue turned to him with a wide, beaming smile. “Red! Edge and I were making lasagna! Wanna try it when it’s done?”

“Eh, sure.”

He sat himself at the table and caught Edge’s gaze. He hoped whatever expression was on his face combined with his small nod conveyed how grateful he was for the mending job. If the nod he got in return was anything to go by, the point got across.

Red’s acquiescence seemed to lift Blue’s mood even higher than it had been — and wasn’t that a wonder? Red’s _anything_ lifting _anyone’s_ spirit? He watched as Blue whirred around the kitchen, saying something about the oven being already on, so he might as well make cupcakes too, and then Edge went on with his intent lesson. 

They’d learned, years ago, that even food could be turned into a weapon, and he wasn’t talking about poison. Once, back when they ‘lived’ in the Capital, he’d made Edge something for lunch. He couldn’t remember what it had been, something slapped together to make sure his baby brother wouldn’t starve, but it didn’t matter. A group of rowdy street urchins had stolen it, and after one of them gobbled it up, they’d taken Edge and threatened to dust him if Red didn’t give them all the gold he had on him. Just because one of them ate the food and recognized his protective intent.

Kids were fucked up. Or maybe it had just been their universe’s kids. He kind of doubted people went around stealing from the homeless around here.

Red didn’t even notice they were done until there was a plate in front of him, still very much steaming, and Blue’s excited face in the rest of his vision as he leaned over the table. “C’mon, try it! Tell me what you think!”

“‘m pretty sure lasagna needs to set,” Red muttered, but he still took a fork and stabbed his way through the dish.

“Nonsense! Lasagna is best served fresh!”

“Whatever y’say, _boss_.” 

He put the forkful of pasta between his teeth. What had his life come to; having lasagna at… the clock said it was 7AM. Breakfast pasta is the thing to make him question his life choices all over again. Sure.

It tasted… pretty damn good, actually.

“That’s pretty damn good, actually,” he said, echoing his thoughts. Also to cool down his conjured tongue. It tasted pretty good, aside from still being scalding hot. It was almost identical to Edge’s usual meals, showing just how much he’d actually helped. And without all that cloying intent dumped in it, Red was free to enjoy the actual taste of tomatoes and meat and cheese. Wild.

Blue’s face lit up like a hundred watt lightbulb, his grin so wide it almost looked painful, like it should’ve cracked his cheekbones. “So you like it?” he asked, like he needed the clarification.

Red shoved another bite into his mouth. “Yeah.”

He swore Blue’s eyelights turned to godsdamned stars. His grin got just a _little_ wider. Now it really should’ve been cracking his face. “Oh, that’s great! I bet if I make my tacos this way, you’ll love those, too!”

And away he bounced, straight towards the fridge to (presumably) check if there were all the ingredients needed, muttering to himself about needing to buy flour. Red watched, even as Edge sat down and started eating his own portion. Blue moved with a surprising grace that Red was sure he himself didn’t possess, a spring in his step and way too much movement involved in the simple task of checking cupboards.

He tried to rake his mind for the last time he’d seen someone this genuinely excited. Or happy. Probably never. It seemed so silly, at least to him. Why would Blue be so excited over some food? Or him liking said food?

He wanted to look away, because his staring was bordering on weird now, and Edge was raising a browbone at him from his peripheral, but he found he couldn’t. He just shoved another forkful into his mouth and chewed the cooling pasta.

Despite there no longer being so much intent that was choking on it, if he focused, underneath the tomato sauce and the layer of melted cheese, he could still taste some. The selfsame excitement he was looking at, care and love.

Red kept staring.

Blue had procured a notepad from somewhere — probably his inventory — and was writing down a shopping list, of all things. The too-wide grin was still on his face, and his eyelights almost seemed to sparkle.

It was so different from everything Red had ever known that he couldn’t stop looking, not even when Edge made a sound at him.

It was refreshing.

It was nice.


	18. red thinks too hard, and it kinda hurts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Red goes on a mental tangent, the chapter.

Red stood in front of the Lab entrance. Nausea threatened to upheave his breakfast at the mere sight of it. He knew there was a camera in the wall, lodged between the large letters, so Al—  _ Undyne _ must’ve seen him coming and was probably watching as he stepped from foot to foot, like a fool.

Edge had been acting like everything was swell and fine, going with Blue to his daily training. Blue had even asked Red to come along, but he’d reacted only a little better than the time he’d been asked to spar. He… wasn’t very proud of his skittishness, but it wasn’t easy to let go of everything he’d been taught, even if he’d never actually experienced it.

Once upon a time, when it had only been Red and ‘Dings, and he hadn’t outgrown his striped shirts yet, his father made sure to teach him all the social cues he himself never fully grasped. And vehemently hammered it into Red’s skull that courting was dangerous and with his dismal stats, he’d just get dusted. Someone would use the guise of courting to lower his guard and stab him in the back.

Maybe literally. Or maybe they’d stab another part of him.

But a kid with one HP to his name was easily scared, and the lessons stuck in Red’s mind to be passed onto his brother. No matter that ‘Dings then went on to teach him the courting dance attacks, anyways, right after.

Red didn’t remember any of them anyways.

His hand felt clammy as he raised it to knock on the thick metal door. Bone hitting metal had always been an interesting sound to him, and he was now distracting himself from the task at hand. Again.

He knocked again, more firmly. No matter his feelings on the Lab, he needed a second opinion from someone who knew at least a little bit of what he was saying, and if that someone was Undyne, then so be it. Sure, he could’ve gone to Stretch, but his brother’s doppelganger liked naps more than even Red did, which was saying something. He couldn’t bring himself to wake the other up. Call it sentimentality, or sympathy from all the times he’d been jerked awake from a good nap and yanked straight into a fight, but if there was no danger to be wary of, why not let him rest up?

The Lab door finally opened to reveal Undyne in all her unkempt glory, just in time to sever another one of Red’s mental tangents. She looked like he hadn’t seen a bed in a week, but she looked the same when he saw her last time, so he rationalized it was probably just her norm.

“O-oh, hi,” she stammered out, looking at him with an expression he couldn’t immediately place.

“Uh,” he started, absolutely perfectly, “does yer offer still stand? ‘Bout… the machine?”

Immediately, he felt foolish, but Undyne’s eyes sparkled at the prospect and she fumbled to open the door wider for him. “O-of course! I’d love to learn more about it! Do you… uh… d-do you have it with you?”

Oh, right. He probably should’ve brought it along in the first place. But, if she had refused, it would’ve just put it in danger from the heat, for no reason at all.

“I c’n uh… go grab it,” he said.

Undyne leveled him with a doubtful look and then peeked behind herself. “Okay. I’ll— I’ll clean up in the me-meantime.”

“I’ll be back in a blink.”

Before she could ask what the hell that even meant, Red had shortcutted himself back into the basement. The machine stood exactly where he’d felt it, display lit up and tauntingly asking him for coordinates. 

Edge said that he wasn’t mad. That he wouldn’t  _ be  _ mad, even if Red didn’t figure out the way back. But he owed it to his brother. He’d worked his bony ass off to get where he was, and to be robbed of it by Red’s fucking carelessness was just unfair and cruel. This was his stars-damned brother, for fuck’s sake! No matter what he said or did, Red would do anything for Edge.

He yanked the power plug out of the socket, glaring daggers at the screen as it darkened. Now, how to go about this?

In the end, he just grabbed each side of the junk box and shortcutted himself back to the Lab, hoping the Void wouldn’t completely scramble the circuits. He found himself inside, just by the door, and the machine  _ seemed  _ to be in one piece. Undyne almost jumped out of her scales, her armful of junk falling back onto the floor.

“R-Red!” she exclaimed, like she’d been expecting literally anybody else. “How did you— I— I mean—! You just vanished!”

Red chuckled, unconsciously scratching the back of his cranium. “Right, y’don’t know. Teleportation.”

There was a gleam to her eyes that instantly put Red on edge. If Alphys —  _ his _ Alphys — had even glanced at him like that, he’d be back in Snowdin already, and all the surveillance cameras in the vicinity would be broken to bits, Asgore’s protection of the Royal Scientist be damned. He had his own, even if it did jack shit for him or Edge.

But Undyne seemed to sense his unease — did he really get so pathetic that a soft-ass version of fucking Alphys-acting Undyne could see through right through him Fuck! She turned towards the machine and eyed it with the same look, not doing much to quell his inkling that she wanted to put him on an examination table and see what made him tick.

“T-that’s it, isn’t it?”

_ No, this was the back-up fucking battery for Gyftmas lights _ . Red bit the remark back. “Yep.”

“Okay. O-Okay. Can you um… bring it up there To my w-workbench” She pointed up the escalator to the higher floor. 

Red nodded, once to himself, and then towards her. He grabbed the edges of the machine again and took a shortcut past the reverse escalator. Undyne rushed up the other one, taking it two steps at a time. Funnily, she was already out of breath by the time she made it to the table.

“O-Okay,” she repeated, panting like she’d just run a marathon. “That— must be p-pretty handy.”

Unconsciously, a grin split Red’s face, a hazy look to his eyelights. “Yeah. Lets me tail it outta fights that’d dust me. Pretty handy, yep.”

Undyne’s already-pale complexion paled even further. “Y-Yeah!” 

She chuckled nervously. Red finally felt a bit more in his element, even if each shadow passing the wall made him want to hurl a bone attack at it. He didn’t see the big deal in talking about things as they were, but he couldn’t imagine any of these people lasting the night back home. All LV ones, no protection, would probably die in one hit, just like when his HP used to be just that — just a one. The thought brought a marrow-chilling comfort to him, somehow.

He slapped the top of the machine, much to Undyne’s utter mortification, and grabbed the cord to plug it into the nearest outlet.

“A’ight, big shot Miss Royal Scientist,” he grinned, only to turn a glare towards the little screen as it lit up again. “This thing works onna basis o’coordinations. How’d ya go ‘bout findin’ new ones?”

* * *

Hours later, and the only even vaguely concrete thing they had come up with was, ‘well, if you only stick your head through and take a look around, you should be able to come back.’ Which they’d prompt tested by sticking their heads through a wormhole portal.

Sure, it had worked, but looking down at your own body, backwards, was not a pleasant experience. Red was contemplating bashing his skull against the wall.

Undyne had then pointed out that there might be universes that look identical to his, so finding the right one would take more investigation than a cursory look. Basically, he’d wasted his whole day and had nothing to show for it. She promised to scour the… other Lab for anything that might be of help, and run some calculations.

Red was grateful, in the same way he’d always been grateful when  _ his  _ Undyne looked out for Edge. Though there was decidedly less glaring and growling right now.

He returned to Blue and Stretch’s house feeling like he’d been up for days instead of just hours and probably looking the same. His headache was back with a vengeance. He found the house empty; a look at the clock told him it was too soon for Blue and Edge to be back from the training and Stretch was on his sentry duty, which meant he was either napping at his post or having the fourth break of the day at Muffet’s.

Red had to suppress an uncomfortable shiver at the fact that he apparently learned their stars-damned schedule. Edge was the only one he’d ever cared about enough to give a shit. Until now, apparently? No, it was just because there was nothing to do (disregarding working on the coordinates, but just the thought of seeing that infernal scrap box again today made him want to tear out his nonexistent hair) and bothering the others wasn’t an option when he didn’t know where they were.

He debated going to join Blue and Edge, for maybe a second, but several things stopped him. Firstly, Alphys seemed to hate his and Edge’s guts, even if they had none, and secondly (and maybe more importantly), if he went to the pathetic excuse of a training grounds, Edge’s words, not his, there’d be a non-zero chance of seeing Blue fight.

Red didn’t know if he was feeling up to that.

No way in hell would they get him to agree to even demonstrate his own magic, but the mental image of Blue, sweaty and giddy as he chucked bone attacks at a training dummy, or maybe at Alphys, made Red’s soul pang with… something. Ever since the shrimp asked him to spar, oblivious to any of the connotations it carried, Red couldn’t stop thinking about it.

‘Dings’ teachings warred with the curiosity of being close to someone, making the hairline cracks in his soul ache if he allowed himself to think about it. Maybe it’d be nice to be close to someone.

The only soulbound couple he’d ever known were Dogamy and Dogaressa, the lieutenants of Edge’s Snowdin unit. Affectionately, it’d been dubbed the canine unit. And by ‘affectionately’, Red meant that he started calling them that to get on Edge’s nerves and it worked  _ so well _ , he’d just never stopped.

But the dogs loved each other, that much was plain for all to see. It was a huge risk to be so open about a bond — maybe just in their universe, but still! A partner meant a weakness that could be used against you. It meant  _ you  _ were a weakness that someone could use against your partner. And the looks the locals gave the dog marriage sometimes made Red’s bones crawl, even when not aimed at him. 

But there were plusses, too.

‘Dings’ signing hands flashed in Red’s mind’s eye like he was seeing them all over again. Binding your soul to another lets you feel what the other feels. It’s more reliable than protective collars. And it gives you an extra set of eyes to keep out.

‘Someone to watch over your back,’ in ‘Dingstalk. To care for you. ‘Dings had been nowhere near a model father, even before the whole Lab fiasco with the King. Red never had anyone to look out for him and that was just fine by him. He’d been the one to do the looking out. Even after Edge made a name for himself, the title of Judge made  _ some  _ people think twice about fucking with them. The ones who knew what it meant.

Red snapped himself out of his pity spiral to teleport to Muffet’s. If Stretch wasn’t there, he’d just add to his tab. Yep. Perfect.

There was no point thinking about relationships, not when he, for all intents and purposes, belonged to the King. Even if Blue’s excitement and smiles made him wish for a brighter future. Even if the thought of him fighting someone right as Red opened the door to the parlor and made the little bell overhead jingle made his soul twitch in his ribcage.

They’d return to their lives as soon as he found a way to.

There was no point in wishing.


	19. not-quite-brotherly-talk from your not-quite-brother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Red tries to escape self-deprecating feelings but gets slapped with more of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> man, red, you better work on those communication skills, huh

The parlor smelled of freshly baked cobwebs and strawberry syrup.

Red had found Stretch at one of the booths, staring out at the snow and tipping back a bottle of honey.

“Don’t rat me out,” Stretch demanded and Red had debated, for a moment. He was split between teasing, asking for a bribe just to see what Stretch would come up with, and conceding to keep the lighthearted atmosphere. But he’d always been an asshole and what better time to toy with someone than when he needed a distraction?

“What’s in it fer me?”

Stretch’s sockets narrowed; he was gauging if Red  _ actually  _ wanted something. “Hey, Muff, can I get a bottle of mustard?”

Muffet looked at him like he grew another head, but the moment she spotted Red, understanding flashed across all five of her eyes. A minute later, a bottle of mustard was set in front of Red. Though he swiped it, never one to turn down free food, Red grinned lecherously.

“Nice one, but ya’ll have ta try a lil’ harder.”

Stretch swore under his breath and then leveled him with a glare. Red glared right back. He’d seen Moldsmal looking more threatening than that and he half-wanted to say so. But he didn’t. The staring ‘contest’ was much too fun.

“Alright, alright, it was worth a shot,” Stretch sighed eventually, looking away. One point for Red. “How about I show you something instead?”

Red took a sip of the mustard. It wasn’t as bitter as the type he was used to from Grillby’s, but it still hit the spot. “Dude, I ain’t a snitch.”

“I know,” Stretch said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “But I’m not taking my offer back.”

That actually took Red aback, just a little, hand freezing in midair before he caught himself and took another gulp. Fuck all this mushy crap, that’s what he was currently  _ avoiding _ . Or was trying to, anyways. Not that anyone could prove it, of course.

“Fine, I’ll bite,” he said with a roll of his eyelights. “What d’ya wanna show me?”

“C’mon, we’re gonna take a shortcut.” Stretch stood up, so Red followed, but only after putting the bottle away for later. No point wasting food, after all. He wasn’t like all these assholes. “Put it on my tab, Muff!”

Muffet called something after them, but Stretch was already pulling him into the biting cold. Well, ‘pulling’ him as much as you could pull someone without touching them. They ducked behind the parlor, underneath the window, and only then did Stretch touch him, placing a hand onto Red’s shoulder to shortcut them.

The world went topsy-turvy, Red’s non-existent stomach lurching. Then, just as suddenly, it was over, but the nausea and newly-developed headache persisted. He thought he finally understood Edge’s refusal to travel with him after the first attempt.

Stretch let go and it took a little too much willpower for Red to stabilize himself. His magic threatened to leave him in the wrong way.

“Fuck—” he gasped, “Remind m’ta never take one a’yer shortcuts…  _ ever  _ again.”

Stretch laughed, as much as one could while tipping back a bottle. Unbelievable. “You’re like my bro. It’s not so bad. You, of all people, should know how it feels, right?” Un- _ fucking _ -believable.

“Oh yeah?” Red challenged, raising his browbone. His grin turned lecherous and he slapped Stretch’s shoulder, gripping the orange fabric in his phalanges. “Why don’t we test it, then, hm?”

“What are you—?”

Red felt all too self-satisfied as he dragged them both through the Void. They reappeared a couple feet to the left and Stretch stumbled away from him, looking as pale as a skeleton could. He doubled over, coughing, but he didn’t throw up either.

Red would’ve thought it a shame, but it seemed to have done the trick. Not like he wanted the dust of any of these pathetic monsters on his hands, anyway.

“Oooh-kay,” Stretch drawled, gasping for breath despite not needing any. “Point.” Another gasp. “Taken.”

“Never again?” Red asked, shoving his hands into his pockets.

Stretch nodded solemnly and then grimaced from an apparent headache. “Deal.”

With that resolved (or maybe not. he was starting to think messing with his brother-from-another-world would be fun), Red looked around. They were in Waterfall, or, more specifically, in Waterfall that Red had only ever heard of in ‘Dings’ stories.

“So… what’re we doin’ here?”

The cavern walls were glimmering with crystals, all colors of the rainbows speckled in the stone. Maybe their Waterfall looked like this, once upon a time, but shiny rocks and precious metals were a great way to broadcast power and stature. Not to mention it was a safer way of storing G than any secret stashes. Red thumbed at one of the rings on his index finger. He himself knew a thing or two about that.

Stretch stuck a cigarette between his teeth and started marching down the cavern. “I’m showing you something.”

“At this rate I’m hopin’ it’s a quick way to dust,” Red deadpanned. He fell into step anyways.

His not-brother turned to look at him for just a second, something unreadable in his expression. Red didn’t like when he couldn’t read someone. It made him uneasy. Stretch just held out his pack of smokes, prompting Red to grab one.

He hadn’t had one in a while. They were expensive and rare, and they never quite hit the mark as well as some other vices he’d fallen into over the years. Following Stretch’s example, he lit it with a small blaster. The smoke curling in his ribcage reminded him of home all the same.

“There you go,” Stretch said, a look in his sockets that betrayed he was up to no good. “Dust, ash, it’s all the same.”

Red glanced at his cigarette, at the bit of ash that dropped to the ground, blinked, and then he was doubling over, choked laughter bounding off the cavern and back, over and over. He hadn’t laughed that hard in a long time.

“Oh, buddy, there’s plenty a’differenc’s ‘tween ash ‘n dust,” he said finally, when he stopped laughing and sighed.

“I know.” Stretch’s smile said he  _ did  _ know, and that it was only said to make Red laugh. Well, objective accomplished, he guessed. “Here we are.” Stretch came to a stop in front of a stream.

One of the namesake waterfalls trickled down into it, and then further down into the darkness. Flowers, large and pinkish, floated on the surface of the stream, swaying in the current. But Red didn’t think they were here to look at flowers. Right?

“Wow. Flowers. Color me impressed.”

Stretch had to lean down a little to punch Red’s shoulder. It gave him time to anticipate it and not cut the hand off as it made contact. “Not the flowers, idiot. Behind the waterfall.”

Red raised a skeptical browbone when Stretch just walked into the ankle-deep water. “Seriously?”

_ "Yeah _ , seriously,” Stretch mimicked him, “Trust me.”

Tall fucking order, considering Red didn’t trust his own shadow, but whatever.

“If this’s a fuckin’ joke, you’re a dead skeleton,” he grumbled.

“Already am.” Stretch waited for him to step into the muddy water, then he walked face-first into the wall. Or what was  _ supposed  _ to be a wall, anyways. Red sighed to himself, in disbelief that he was actually going along with this, and followed.

The water felt even colder falling on him than on his shins; he had to try really hard not to shiver. It must’ve been freezing for him to feel it. He shrugged his jacket off to wring the water out of it. Gross. He  _ was  _ about to glare at Stretch — why couldn’t they just have shortcutted inside?! — but he stopped dead in his tracks.

They’d emerged in a cavern, only lit by the glow of crystals embedded in the walls, the couple echo flowers strewn about, and the reflective surface of a small pond. Everything twinkled as the water swayed back and forth, shadows dancing along the uneven stone, and reeds peeking from the pond. It felt like walking into a whole another universe; and trust him, Red also knew a thing or two about  _ that _ .

He must have looked like an idiot, standing there with a slack jaw, but Stretch didn’t call him out on it.

“Pretty neat, huh?”

Not too hard, anyway.

Wanton to save face, Red just grumbled something that sounded vaguely like, “I guess.”

Stretch sat himself down next to the pond, apparently not bothered by the fact that his hoodie was soaking wet. He didn’t pat the ground next to himself like Red expected, so he couldn’t even lash out. He sat down as well.

Within the safety of his own mind, he could admit that the cavern was pretty. He’d never seen anything like this. Their Waterfall was a decrepit extension of the dump, the only stable and somewhat decent parts of it deep in the middle, where Undyne lived. The walls were brittle, chipped away by monsters craving the selfsame crystals that surrounded him now.

The water was littered with trash, echo flowers trampled at the root lest they clue someone about the happenings that took place within the caverns — deals, blackmail… and especially the less savory practices. From time to time, Edge still liked to take a walk through the place, in search of any that might have grown unseen. Anything to make his job easier, he’d said. 

Red will not admit to trampling one that incriminated Muffet before Edge could find it. It’d been better he handled it alone. You didn’t fuck with Muffet, it was in the survival manual, black on white. Of course, there was no such manual. If only.

“Undyne called,” Stretch said. There was no underlying tone, he was just stating a fact, but Red’s shoulders stiffened nonetheless.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Asked me about her research. Probability calculations.”

Red huffed. “What’s this? If you got somethin’ ta say, stop beatin’ ‘round the bush.”

Stretch huffed out as well, a laugh. “Okay, gee. You went to her for help with the machine, didn’t you?”

Defensiveness prickled Red’s bones. Was this a test of some sort? Was the Judge fucking judging him? “So?”

“So? So nothing, I was just curious,” the taller skeleton said. “I take it you didn’t get nowhere if she asked  _ me  _ for help. I haven’t touched that stuff i ages.”

He sighed, looking off to the side. A large blue crystal caught his attention, wedged in the crevice of the wall. “No easy way ta find th’coordinates,” he admitted. There was no point hiding it if he’d already confessed to Edge how useless he was.

“So you might be stuck here?”

Hearing it said was… well. It wasn’t like Red didn’t know about the likely outcome, but there was a difference between knowing and keeping a degree of denial, and being smacked in the face with it.

“Not if I can fuckin’ h—”

“Y’know,” Stretch cut him off, “Blue’s real happy having you two around.”

What.

“ _What_?” he echoed his thoughts.

“Yeah. I mean, he almost talked my ear off yesterday, about all the tricks that Edge taught him. And I don’t have ears. It was a very long monologue.”

“What,” Red repeated, browbones furrowing, “does th’t have ta do with anythin’?”

Nevermind the fact that it’d been Red who taught  _ Edge  _ all those tricks. Was that like indirect training? Should he be upset?

“Well, I don’t really care, and Blue likes you guys around. Says you’re really cool. He didn’t tell me anything concrete, don’t worry, but he thinks your universe isn’t very nice.”

“So he’d told me,” he grumbled, “Yer beatin’ the bush again.”

Stretch held up his hands in mock surrender. “Weeeell, bottom line is, why not just stay?”

Red should’ve expected this, he really should’ve/ Blue told him something like this, too. But instead, anger welled inside his soul. “My bro worked his damned coccyx off ta get where he is, ‘n you’re tellin’ me ta just throw it all away?! How fuckin’ dumb d’ya think I am! Ain’t no way I’m doin’ that ta him!”

Stretch didn’t say anything for a while, just looked at him blankly as he his outburst. The lack of yelling back was what really made him stop, despite a million things ready on the tip of his metaphorical tongue. Breathing labored and phalanges digging into his palms, Red fell silent.

“Your bro’s an adult, isn’t he?” Stretch asked him, then.

“‘Course he is!” And stars be damned, Red took  _ pride  _ in that. Edge could’ve ended as just another pile of dust — they both could’ve — but they  _ didn’t _ .

“Then don’t make his choices for him. Do you even know if he wants to go back?”

Red had felt a lot of things in his life. He knew what LV felt like, boiling the marrow inside his bones. He knew what it felt like to take someone’s life. A lot of things caught him off guard, though less and less the older he’d gotten. But never before had he felt this taken aback. It felt like a slap straight to his soul.

What  _ did  _ Edge want?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyways im promoting my [blog](https://armethaumaturgy.tumblr.com/). come say hi


	20. brotherly talk from your brothers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The brothers finally have a soul-to-soul. Both of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the truth come out (finally, haha. these convos were long necessary):  
> does edge is love him brother? and does blue is gay? yes

Despite what all the inhabitants of the Underground would say, Red was a sensible monster. In fact, he was the most sensible monster in existence, so he did the most sensible thing he could. Which was nothing at all.

He was quite good at that, if only his mind got with the program. It kept racing a million miles an hour. Sleep eluded him like the plague, so at nights, he sat on the racecar bed and stared off through the plaster like the blurry visages of human heroes taped to it held the key to his troubles.

He was a sensible monster. He was sensible, and he knew he could find the answer like he always did — through observation. He watched Edge cook with Blue, watched him hide a grin at Stretch's jokes, watched him tap his foot impatiently when the time to go to training came. He felt like an outsider looking in, seeing everything for the first time.

Had he been wrong about his brother his whole life?

His sensibility lasted all of five days.

Under the cover of darkness, he sat on the edge of the bed and reached out to shake Edge awake. His hand faltered halfway and he swallowed dryly before he actually touched his brother. His sockets flew open almost immediately, hand twitching by his side.

They stared at each other for a long, long minute, and then Edge pushed himself upright to regard him with a flat look. "What happened, brother?"

Red's silver tongue failed him, despite his mind playing out this conversation more times than he could or cared to count. "You..." His shoulders slumped, throat tight.

Edge rose a browbone. "I?" he repeated, tone mocking, "Spit it out, Red, what is it? You look terrible."

"Par fer the course," Red forced out, alongside an equally forced laugh.

Silence stretched between them again.

"Alright, if you won't spill it, I'm just going back to bed. I can just beat it out of you in the morning."

"Do you like it here?"

Red shook, cold sweat beading down his skull. His soul hammered in his ribcage.

"I…" Edge seemed just as taken aback by the question as Red felt having spilled it so unceremoniously. "I suppose so. This couldn't have waited until morning?"

No, Red refused to say. One more minute of feeling like the worst brother in the history of monsterkind, and his soul would've imploded in on itself. That's what it felt like, anyway.

"Do you want to get… home?" he asked, instead.

Edge looked down at him, sockets narrowed as he regarded the question. Red could see something akin to recognition cross his features, and that was when Edge sighed, deep and almost tired, and Red knew it had nothing to do with the late hour.

"No. I don't think I do."

Red deflated like a balloon, looking off to the side, because looking straight at his brother felt like a feat he couldn't manage anymore. Sure, he'd expected that answer — Stretch had said pretty much the same thing, and wasn't that fucking pathetic, that Stretch of all people could understand his brother better than Red himself? — but that did nothing to lessen the feeling of his soul plummeting somewhere down into his stomach cavity.

"I know what you're thinking," Edge told him. His voice was stern, and just what Red needed to sever his train of thought at the root. He should've felt bad, after years of painting himself as strong and nonchalant to save his brother having to worry, and he did feel bad, but not about that. He still couldn't wrap his mind around the fact that Edge seemed to understand him and could read him like a dumb fucking book. He'd always prided himself on being the one about to do that.

He didn't know how he wanted to feel about it, so he defaulted to laughing, like he always did.

"Brother," Edge started, his face setting into that determined look he wore on duty. "I've been thinking, since we got here. About our universe. And I'm glad for that, before you start blaming yourself again."

Red's skull colored his namesake at being called out.

"I don't think either of us thought much about it. It was just how things were and we never knew different. But seeing this universe… I realized something. I don't fancy a world of kill or be killed."

Fuck.

They didn't show emotions. Emotions were weaknesses to be exploited. But Red's sockets overflowed with tears despite years of schooling himself not to cry around anyone (though not as well as he'd wanted, apparently). "Fuck," he muttered. He sounded like a fool even to himself. "'m so fuckin' proud of ya, Paps."

Years ago, he'd tried his best to make sure Edge didn't have to dust anyone. First-hand experience with LV made him want to keep Edge as far away from the tumult of emotions of it as monsterly possible. Necessity forced their hands, but just the knowledge that his brother did not revel in it… Red's soul swelled with pride.

Edge's look softened by a small margin. "There may be something about this whole soul-to-soul thing." He spread his arms as if in invitation and Red wasn't convinced he'd ever moved that fast in his life, for any reason.

Hugs… they were nice.

The last time they'd shared one, Edge was still in stripes. His ribs dug into Red's own through the layers of his hoodie and borrowed shirt, but he didn't mind. Edge let Red cry into his scarf, until he had no tears left to shed. Somehow, he felt better afterwards.

"I was so proud to finally join the Guard. I thought it'd make you proud. That our lives would, somehow, change. I guess I was naive. You were still the Judge and nothing changed. Our world would never change for anything save a revolution. But the King wouldn't let that happen. And here… they're all wimps, but I think they're happy."

"Ya really did think about this a lot, huh?"

"Yes," Edge nodded resolutely. "I… care about you. I always did. I know you like to think I didn't, because you tried to raise me that way. And I also know it was to protect me. You thought your HP would be detrimental, to me. But you're my brother, you always will be. I want you to be happy the same way you want me to be happy."

And for the second time in about as many minutes, Red cried.

He wasn't sure if Edge heard him sob an 'I love ya, bro,' into his chest, but Edge held him until they both passed out.

* * *

Stretch could probably pinpoint, with an hourly accuracy, exactly when Red talked to Edge, because his entire attitude did a one-eighty.

Not once all day had he even shown the desire to go to the basement and continue his chase for a way back. Don't tell anyone, but he was glad. He'd told Red he didn't care about them staying, but the truth was he saw himself in them, and just wanted to keep an eyesocket out for them so they wouldn't fall as low as he had in his younger years. The bar was probably way different for what 'falling low' was between them (theirs would probably involve actual Falling, and Stretch had to force himself not to think about that), but the sentiment stood firm in his mind.

Now to talk to his own brother, which still posed a challenge to him. Oh,h, he knew Blue wouldn't judge him no matter what, nor would he judge Red and Edge, but whatever glob of magic substituted Stretch's brain begged to differ. And it begged almost non-stop. Sometimes he wished for a new glob of magic.

"Hey, bro," he said, subtly placing himself between Blue and the door as he strapped his chest piece on.

Blue got the clasps tied snugly and smoothed the hem of his bodysuit's sleeve over the Deltarune pin so it shone as bright as possible. He turned a wide, excited grin at Stretch. He, too, must've noticed the shift in their new housemates' attitudes. Red had been making a lot of puns, much to Stretch's (and sometimes Blue's) amusement. And Edge's apparent frustration. 

"Don't tell me," he said, placing a hand onto his hip. "It is Gyftmas and a miracle made you want to come train with me."

Stretch gave as good as he got, at least in the grinning department. "Nah, not gonna happen unless the barrier breaks down. But," he drew that word out. His fingers itched to grab a cigarette, but Blue didn't like the smoke, and he forbade smoking inside either way. So they just curled around nothing in his pocket. "Speaking of training, I did want to talk to you about it."

Blue, bless his soul, got excited all over again. "Sounds like someone does want to train, but is scared of admitting it!"

"You wish." 

Blue shrugged, nonplussed in the slightest.

“Okay, so… You remember when Red and Edge came here, right?” Blue stared at him like he was asking a trick question, but that was fine. 

He needed to start at the… well,  _ start _ . And because he was a smart monster, he’d (smartly) sent both the brothers to Muffet’s, making up a lack of groceries when Blue wasn’t listening. Red jumped on the offer when he said to put it on his tab, so this was the best time to clear the whole fighting-as-courting thing.

“Yes?” Blue answered, though it sounded more like a question in its own, “I don’t think I could forget something like that, mweheh. What do they have to do with your training?”

Stretch sighed. “I told you we’re not talking about  _ my _ training. Actually, we’re not talking about training. Forget about that.”

“You’re the one who brought it up!”

“Stars, okay, fuck—”

“Language, Papy.”

Stretch let out a groan, rubbing idly at one of his temples. Why had he been worried about talking to his brother again? This was a proper headache more than anything. “Okay. Okay! Just— You asked Red to spar with you. And he got mad and ran away, right?”

“Yeah. He seems to not like the idea of sparring with me.”

“Edge talked to me about it afterwards, when you left. It’s uh… Sparring and fighting and all that is different over there. So you… kinda asked to court Red? I was meaning to tell you, but I forgot. I’m still kinda a  _ bonehead _ , you know?”

Blue stared up at him for a moment, expression tense but Stretch couldn’t even guess what he was thinking. He said nothing at the pun. Finally, his teeth parted, but all that came out of them was, “ _ Oh _ . That’s unfortunate.”

_ Unfortunate? _

Stretch raised a browbone. “Unfortunate?”

“Well, yeah! I didn’t know it meant so much. If I did, I would’ve gone about it differently.” Blue seemed deep in thought; it was obvious even before he started tapping a phalange against his chin. “Do you think I ruined my chances?”

“I’m sorry?” was all Stretch could say. He must’ve misheard, surely.

“I asked if you think I ruined my chances. Like, if I go to Edge and ask him how to go about it properly, do you think he’d help? He should’ve told that whole  _ sparring thing  _ himself. No offence, bro, but you barely remember to put on pajamas to bed.”

Stretch laughed, when the initial shock fell off. Well, he’d be the first one to say he didn’t see this coming. “Told you I’m a  _ numbskull _ . Or was it a  _ bonehead _ ? But it’s okay, because I crack us both up.” He cracked his knuckles for the effect, and Blue snorted into his hand. “But seriously now — I can’t and won’t stop you, but is that what you really want?”

He should’ve seen this coming, but the only time he’d ever seen Blue interested in  _ anyone _ , it was Alphys, and that was ages ago, before they became friends at all. Blue’s puppy love had fallen off in a matter of weeks for a deeper-seated respect.

His brother’s skull flushed his namesake and his hand moved to scratch at his cranium. “Well… The Magnificent Blue has very high standards! But I think… that Red meets them all? I’d give it a shot, and I was trying to think of a way to, but now that you told me I screwed up in the whole department...”

Feeling only a bit bad, Stretch placed a hand onto Blue’s pauldroned shoulder. “I dunno, I’m sure he’d understand you  _ didn’t _ understand. If it’ll make you happy, why not try?”

It was honestly a little soul-warming, to see how fast and how much Blue lit up with just that little bit of encouragement. His eyelights sparkled into their preferred star shapes and he grinned, clenching his fists before him. He nodded resolutely, more to himself than anything else.

“You’re right! Nothing ventured, nothing gained, dear brother!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alright. so with the help of my beautiful wife, bless him, i finally fleshed out this whole story, and got a sequel to plot out. i expect another ~10ish chapters for this one, and then a 180 to the plot, haha. hope yall enjoy!


	21. on the topic of fun

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blue shows Red the riddles he had set up to capture a human.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i love red, cat walking into cling wrap-looking ass

Red didn’t know how to be happy. He was almost certain he was screwing it up one way or another, but no one called him out on it. Yet.

Though the only person around was Blue, who had insisted on showing him his traps — or more accurately, his riddles — set up to capture a human if one ever fell into the Underground. They’d trekked all the way to the Ruins through a worn, but snow-coated path in the forest, because in Blue’s words, ‘ _ it was best experienced live! _ ’

All Red gathered from that was that Blue wanted him to solve those riddles, and do it in order. Fair enough. He wasn’t much for mind games himself, he preferred a straightforward trap that would, as its name would suggest,  _ trap  _ his prey, or at least amputate a limb if it didn’t. You know, leave them vulnerable for a good old bone attack to the soul. He was… pretty sure that was off the table around here, though.

So they took a walk. Red threw a look towards the sealed door, but Blue ignored it completely. It was still baffling to him that there was Asgore —  _ an  _ Asgore — behind those doors, and Red had talked to him.  _ Without  _ almost dying. He tried to push those thoughts out of his mind, because it really wasn’t the time to have a meltdown. He was supposed to be happy now, right? And he was sure  _ happy  _ people didn’t have meltdowns.

So, after ignoring the Ruins (or pretending to), the main road took them to the little bridge set up by the sentry station. He was used to it being made of spiked iron rods, but instead there stood wooden beams, too far apart to stop anyone from just walking through.

“Uh?” Red turned a quizzical look in Blue’s direction, because the shorter skeleton had stopped.

“This is the first puzzle!” Blue stated, hands on hips and looking more smug than he had any reason to. He pointed to a wooden sign lodged between a small pile of rocks, with haphazard writing carved into it. 

Red squinted at it; it was a font he was all too familiar with, and that was probably the only reason he could manage to decipher it.

_ LEFT IS LEFT _ _   
_ _ RIGHT IS WRONG _ _   
_ _ RIGHT IS RIGHT _ _   
_ _ LEFT IS LEFT _

Red stared at the riddle for a second. His mind was drawing a blank, and despite the smaller footnote of  _ ‘IF YOU’RE HAVING TROUBLE, THERE IS A HINT ON THE BACK!’ _ , he just picked a direction. It said right is right,  _ right _ ? Then that must’ve been it.

A beam split the bridge in half, so he headed through the right side of it. Blue watched him closely, and when Red ran into an invisible wall and fell onto his ass, he started giggling.

“Mwehehe! You got it wrong! The Magnificent Blue’s riddles are the best in the Underground!” he boasted, trying (and failing) to hide his snickering. Red couldn’t even be mad because it was a nice sound.

“Yeah, yeah, hilarious,” Red muttered as he picked himself off the ground. He placed a hand onto the invisible wall; it gave a bit under the pressure, and upon closer inspection, he could see where individual pieces of whatever it was made of connected.

“Please be careful,” Blue said, prompting Red to pull his hand away. “It’s um… ‘cling wrap’? I think. I found a roll of it in the dump and thought it’d spruce up this place!”

“I’ve no idea what that even is. And what’s up wit’ that riddle, ‘nyways?”

“Hm? What do you mean? I thought it was pretty simple, personally. Do you think a human will have trouble with it, too?”

“Simple? It don’t make no sense!”

“Does too! You just don’t have appreciation for the fine arts! Of riddles. Yes.”

“Are ya callin’ me dumb, darlin’?”

Blue didn’t answer for half a second too long.

“Alright, that’s it!” Red huffed, lunging himself at Blue. With a squeak, Blue ducked and started running. He was in shape and had the advantage of home field, but Red had run his fair share, too.

He caught up with the other skeleton by the frozen lake. With a tackle, they both went tumbling to the ground in a tangle of limbs. Blue was still giggling, as he had been the entire time, and Red’s movements had no intent behind them. They rolled across the frozen layer of ice as they tried to one-up each other, snow clinging to their clothes.

“I yield!” Blue laughed as Red towered over him, holding down his wrists.

Red huffed out a sigh, ribcage rising and falling with his labored breathing. “Fuck yeah ya do, sweeheart.”

Blue wiggled in his hold, his laughs dying down to nervous chuckles. That was the exact moment Red realized just how  _ close  _ they had ended up. Their faces were close enough to see the sprinkle of freckles scattered across Blue’s skull. He wasn’t sure how he’d never noticed them before, but there they were, all the more prominent with the blue blush spread beneath them. Red’s femurs dug into Blue’s hips, and he was sitting way too high for what must’ve been comfortable.

“You can uh… move now?” Blue suggested. Stars, there was an ever-so-subtle glow coming from under his chestpiece as his soul worked overtime. “I already yielded.”

Red blinked. Magic rushed up to his skull and colored it his namesake. He couldn’t scrabble fast enough to get off of Blue; he almost slipped on the ice in the process. An apology itched on the tip of his metaphorical tongue — wait. Oh stars, when had  _ that  _ manifested? He bit it back when Blue just stood up and patted his shorts to get rid of the snow stuck to the fabric. He was acting like nothing happened, despite his blush, so Red tried to do the same.

It was hard, though, to ignore his own flaming skull and the memory of Blue’s so close. He was warmer than Red ever would’ve guessed. But even more than that, Blue’s laughter rang in his mind.

That was… as close to sparring as you could get without actually sparring. Red felt ashamed of himself; he wasn’t sure what had gotten into him to do that.

“That was fun!” Blue said, his radiant smile present once more, and then pointed down a path. “We missed one of the riddles, though. We should go back.”

_ Fun _ .

Red wasn’t sure if that was classified as fun. Did he like it? Yeah, more than he should’ve. Did he feel awful for taking advantage of blue like that? Oh,  _ definitely _ . His hands clutched nothing in his pockets, claws digging into the palms. But if Blue had had fun… well, unless he was lying about that.

Oh fucking  _ stars _ , this shit was confusing. Where was the hostility and yelling he was used to and could deal with? Blue should’ve been snarling at him the moment he’d put a hand onto him.

But he didn’t.

“Reeed! Come on!”

A snap in front of his face shook him out of his mind. Blue was looking at him, browbones furrowed in concern. The blush was gone from his face, but the freckles weren’t, and now that Red knew they were there, he couldn’t stop noticing them, and staring like a fool. They were like little constellations that he  _ kind  _ of wanted to trace, even if logically he knew they were just pores in the bone that magic shone through.

“Uh, yeah,” he said. Nailed it. He definitely wasn’t thinking of every instance Blue had asked to spar with him, each in a new light. Nope.

Blue led them back the way they came, past the rushed footsteps they’d left to the Dogs’ houses. He wondered, for a second, if Dogamy and Dogaressa were also soulbound in this universe. They had to be, right? If they managed to be together in the shithole Red was from, there was nothing stopping them from being even  _ mushier  _ in this place.

He didn’t have the time to think too long on it, because Blue stopped at a small ravine, which he jumped over with a running start. Red followed. He couldn't even remember them passing it; it wasn’t too big, but definitely not something he’d test. So, in the spirit of not falling to his doom, he just shortcutted over it.

“That’s  _ so  _ not fair!”

Red shrugged, looking away because Blue  _ pouted _ .  _ That _ wasn’t fair. “I ain’t doin’ it to get past the riddles, jeez.”

His counterpart seemed satisfied with that. He left Red to deal with the riddle presented; another wooden sign and half a dozen pedestals with levers installed on their fronts. Random trinkets sat on each, presumably potential answers.

“What’s stoppin’ me from ju’ flippin’ all of ‘em, darling?”

Blue’s pout turned into a glare. “Spirit of challenge!”

“A’ight, a'ight, lemme look at it.”

_ I RUN BUT CANNOT WALK.  _ _   
_ _ SOMETIMES I SING BUT NEVER TALK.  _ __   
_ I LACK ARMS YET POINT SOUTH  _ _   
_ __ WITH BOTH HANDS TWICE DAILY

“Okay, what the fuck?”

“Gosh, you really need to do something about that sailor mouth of yours.”

“ _ Prithee _ , what the  _ alas _ ?”

Blue rolled his eyelights. “That’s not what I meant…”

Instead of teasing further, Red turned towards the pedestals. He’d already failed one riddle, and he didn’t want Blue to think him an idiot (though he’d never admit so out loud). Only one problem with that — he wasn’t good at riddles, and he had no idea what the answer was.

Even looking at the options wasn’t helping. On one pedestal sat a pair of shoes for some sort of small monster, on another, a glove. An empty plate, a broken watch, a half-full cup of… something orange and frozen, and a book. Yeah, none of those made sense.

“Would you like a hint?” Blue asked him when he just stood there, staring off into space.

“Uh, sure.”

“It’s not a plate. And it’s not a cup.”

Well, that…. narrowed it down, he guessed? He was starting to feel stupid to  _ himself _ , so he walked up to the nearest pedestal — the one with the shoes — and yanked the lever down.

And… nothing happened. Save Blue laughing again, but he was sure the  _ lever  _ wasn’t connected to  _ Blue _ .

Red’s cheekbones heated up again and he started flipping all the levers, spirit of challenge be damned. One of them clicked differently and unwound a hidden walkway across the gap.

“You’re not very good at riddle, are you”

“Guess not, pum’kin. ‘m great at jokes, though. Knock knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Owls go,” Red grinned.

“Owls go who?”

“Yer gettin’ it now, sweetpea!”

Red guffawed; it took a moment of confusion for Blue to get it, but then he chuckled too. “Okay, that was pretty good. Hey, what has a neck but no head?”

“Hm… a decapitated human?”

Despite punching Red’s shoulder, Blue was still laughing, maybe even louder than before. “No, dummy! A bottle!”

“I like my answer more. Knock knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Robin.”

“Robin who?”

Red summoned a small bone and pointed it at Blue. “Robin  _ ya _ ! Hand over yer G!”

They were both laughing so hard that if either of them truly needed to breathe, they’d probably fall over. There was no one around to hear them be silly, and the cold was starting to get biting, but they stayed and exchanged riddles upon jokes until the forest around them started to turn dark.

And Red thought he was slowly starting to understand how to have fun. How not to expect someone to dust him at the first opportunity.

It was nice.


	22. blue's apparent confession and red's blundering

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which feelings are talked about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god, hes so stupid. i write red and i make him so stupid and call it a day i guess

Nope, nope, nope, _nope_!

The familiar beginnings of a panic attack — cold sweat, beating soul, blanking mind — he could feel them all setting in. And all Blue had said as they headed home was ‘Hey, I just wanted to talk about the uh… sparring thing.’ And he was _still_ talking, but Red couldn’t parse a word out of it.

“Uh… what?” He scratched at his palm, used the little jolt of pain to ground himself.

Blue stopped his rambling mid-word, and then actually stopped, like he’d run into an invisible wall. He floundered, opened his mouth, floundered when nothing came out of it, closed it, and then seemed to compose himself.

“W-well, uh… The sparring thing!” he said, and Red had to compose _himself_ because the ringing in his acoustic meatuses was getting too loud once again. “Uh, Papy told me what it means for you, and, well… I wanted to apologize.”

Red didn’t know what was worse: Edge apparently telling Stretch, or the fact that Stretch told Blue. Now _everyone_ knew how hard he’d fucked up.

“S’fine,” he muttered, and then mentally patted himself on the back for not sounding choked up, “Y’didn’t know.”

“But I do now.”

And Red wished he didn’t, because he’d rather have been talking about anything else. The Snowdin sign was glowing off in the distance, bright and unvandalized; they were so close to the house. And here they were, standing still in the middle of the path. He could usually get out of any situation, but that hinged on the ‘situation’ being ‘an imminent fight’. He couldn’t very well just shortcut himself away from Blue.

Well, he _could_ , but that would probably be rude?

“--and I wanted to make sure I didn’t… I dunno, make it weird?”

“Uh, what?”

He… really needed to stop zoning out.

Blue smiled, soft and… Red realized he didn’t know what that meant. He was starting to realize he couldn’t really read people as well as he’d thought he could.

“You don’t really want to talk about this, do you,” Blue asked, though it sounded more like a statement. Red gave a shrug instead of an answer, because there was no point in lying to himself. Blue’s smile didn’t drop; his browbones furrowed a little, however. “I’m sorry. But I think this is important, so… please deal with me for a moment?”

Now _that_ was a question, a plea, even. The implication that he could still say no and Blue would (most likely drop it was the only thing that actually made him say, “Okay.”

The smile he got in return was wide and beaming, and if Blue was getting tired like Red was, he couldn’t tell. “Thank you! I- wanted to start over?”

“Start over?”

“Yeah, like… Now what I know what sparring means to you, I wanted to apologize for just asking carelessly. Red…” Blue’s eyelights were piercing, and Red waned to look away, look anywhere but at him, but found he couldn’t. “I like you. Would you do me the honor of sparring with me?”

Red blanched, staring at Blue like he’d just grown another head. It took an embarrassingly long while for him to process the words said, and when he did, he started chuckling. For how he couldn’t look away from the smaller skeleton before, he sure couldn’t look at him now.

“Wow, yer some kinda narcissist, ain’t ya”? he laughed.

Blue wasn’t laughing. He was staring at Red with an uncomfortable intenseness. Red’s laugh slowly died down, an incredulous look left on his face. 

“Yer serious…” It was just a whisper, but loud enough for Blue to hear, and nod.

Red’s face went through all five stages of grief, then did it backwards, and just for the hell of it, went through them one more time. He had no idea how to react.

“You don’t have to answer right now,” Blue said, “I just wanted to ask, cause… well, you’re almost as cool as me! And yeah, like I said, I… really like you. Wanted to ask before you went back home, heh heh.”

“Blue, uh… we ain’t leavin’,” Red corrected, because at least then he wasn’t addressing the elephant in the forest.

“You’re not? That’s great!”

Red couldn’t really see what Blue would find so ‘great’ in them staying, except he could, because Blue just told him. And he didn’t have an answer. He felt like an asshole — which, sure, wasn’t uncommon for him, but still.

“Yep. No coordinates back home. Gonna eat ya outta yers,” he snorted, but just as quick, his face fell again. “Look, sweetheart… y’can do better ‘an me. Y’don’t even know me.”

“Then I’ll get to know you more. But I think you sell yourself short.”

“Blue, I’ve dusted people. I ain’t a good person. Why not just… I dunno, find someone local?”

For a second, Blue looked off into the distance with a small hum. Then that weird, soft smile was back. “It sounds like a norm in your world. I can’t judge people for their world. Plus, a _bad_ person wouldn’t try to convince me they’re bad. And you just said you’re staying, so you _are_ local now.” 

Blue said it with such finality that Red felt like he’d just gotten punched straight in the sternum. What could he even say to that? Was there even anything appropriate? Red was finding himself stumped by social expectations yet again.

“I’ll uh… think ‘bout it?”

Obviously, that was the right thing to say, because Blue lit up like a fucking Gyftmas tree, and he looked at Red like he personally put stars in the goddamn sky. Metaphorical stars. In the metaphorical sky.

“Thank you.”

There was something other than anxiety burrowing in his soul, something warm and pleasant, and Red was just about done trying to figure all the mushy crap out by himself.

Thank the angel that Blue started walking again.

* * *

Blue didn’t bring it up again, and just contented himself with making dinner when they got back inside. Red retreated upstairs, and found Edge in their room, pacing back and forth.

“Edge,” Red greeted, soul soaring at the sight of his brother. He needed a second opinion on whatever the hell was going on, and there was nothing to really fuck up if Edge already cared about him, right? At least that’s what he told himself to feel better about contemplating to confide something so important. “I gotta tell ya somethin’. Blue—”

Edge stopped his pacing when he registered Red’s presence. He turned to face him with a determined look, his heel clacking on the wooden floor as he did so. Red was sure Blue appreciated the break from rhythmic pounding in the ceiling.

“Red,” Edge greeted back, cutting him off. “I’ve decided I will ask Alphys to join the local Royal Guard.”

Whatever Red was about to say — the whole Blue asking to court him, and so politely, too, thing — died on his tongue, and he looked from Edge to the window, back to Edge, to the window again, and finally at Edge. The artificial lights had dimmed ages ago; it had to be getting pretty late.

“Bro… it’s fuckin’ night. She’s gonna tell you to fuck off. Or she’s gonna tell you to fuck off anyway, b'cause she hates LV.”

Edge folded his arms and it was obvious he was seeing the truth in Red’s words, but his posture and body language screamed defiance against it before he even opened his mouth. “She has acknowledged my battle prowess. And if she is anything like Undyne, she will admire my dedication.”

‘Dedication,’ yeah. Red could remember the time Edge had gone to Undyne to ask (definitely _not_ beg) to join the Guard. She slammed the door on him, yelled through it about it being midnight, and finally tested him in the morning when she found him still there. Red… wasn’t sure Alphys would do the same.

“Why didn’t ya do it earlier!”

“I… was formulating the perfect pitch.”

“All fuckin’ day?!”

“Shut up! The great and terrible Edge doesn’t half-ass things, unlike you!”

Red scoffed, shaking his head. Good old Edge, always the same. Maybe arguing with him would take his mind off of things, if it were possible. But it wasn’t, because he was still filled with anxiety.

“Before ya go, bro. Can we have one of those soul-ta-souls or whatever again?” he asked. He could feel the sweat beading on his forehead, but Edge’s jab lacked any heat.

“Well, you certainly took to them, didn’t you?”

Red’s face heated up nonetheless, and he batted at Edge, who was more than fast enough to get out of range. “Asshole. This’s important.”

He looked around, listening to see if it was safe to talk. Edge seemed to catch on and waited with a raised browbone for Red to come to his conclusion.

“You clear?”

“I, yeah— I’m—” Red hesitated, once again thrown off. It seemed to be a trend. “I’m clear. It’s Blue, he— well, he asked to spar me. Again.”

Edge’s features contorted into a scoff and he all but growled. “Stretch said he’d fucking tell him to knock it off. Guess you can’t even trust yourself to do something.”

“Bro, chill. He… he did tell ‘im. S’why I’m tellin’ you. He…” Red gestured with a hand, some nonsensical thing because he couldn’t hold still, “apologized. Fer doin’ it earlier. Told me he knows what it means now. But then he— he asked again! But like— okay, he said, ‘would ya gimme the honor of sparring me?’ and like, I don’t know what to do?”

Edge regarded him with that hard, calculating look that he loved to judge people with before asking, “What’d you say?”

“Nothin’! Said I’d think about it. He… said I didn’t have ta answer right away, so I… didn’t.”

His brother’s sockets narrowed; he was gauging if Red was leaving something out or not. Apparently, he determined that Red wasn’t, in fact, leaving anything out. “Well then, I suggest you think about it,” he said, and then he nodded, like he’d just told Red some stars-damned secret of the universe.

“What the fuck? What’d you think I’ve been doin’?! Y’really ain’t got anything else to say?”

“What do you want me to say? I’m not the one being courted.”

“I— I don’t fuckin’ know! Y’think he’s bullshitting me? Or— I don’t fuckin’ know!”

“ _I_ don’t know, Red. Do _you_ think he’s bullshitting you?”

“No?”

“ _No_?”

Sure, Red didn’t sound convinced even to himself, but that was no reason for Edge to make fun of him. He sent a bone attack flying at him, but it was sidestepped without any trouble. “No,” he repeated, “I think he’s too stupid, too nice— too fuckin’ sweet ta — oh, _fuck_ you!”

Edge had raised a browbone again, looking at him with an expression that just screamed ‘you’re an idiot.’ Red had to restrain himself from throwing an _actual_ attack at him.

“Well, my earlier advice still stands. Think about it yourself. I will go get myself a job while you do that.”

Red glared at his brother as he made his way out of the room, and even harder when he turned back in the doorway.

“I will let you know I have the entire dating manual memorized, should you need it. I know you haven’t even opened it.”

Red’s next thrown bone lodged itself harmlessly into the closing door. Screw Edge and his extremely niche interests. And the fact that those extremely niche interests came in handy sometimes.


	23. you could write a love song about today

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which red is _so_ oblivious to his feelings, until he isn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> unu im sorry for how long this chapter took... ive been brainstorming so many ideas lately haha

Edge did not return all night and all morning. Red knew because he couldn’t get a wink of sleep, no matter how hard he tried. And believe him, he tried.

A cocktail of anxiety and just plain worry kept him up, his thoughts stuck in a whirlpool of what ifs. One could almost call it Molotov. Which is how he ended up in the kitchen in the morning, up before anyone else and looking out at the slowly falling sow through the window.

The longer Edge didn’t return, the more worried Red grew, because he’d only seen Alphys that one time, and she didn’t have the best track record of his attitude. And Edge was alone.

He unconsciously clawed at the collar resting on his neck. What if she decided to dust him? It would’ve been hypocritical of her, after condemning their LV, but if she was anything like their Undyne…

Thankfully, Blue’s routine made him wake up with the sunrise, so while Red was busying himself with staring at nothing, he made his way downstairs, chipper as always.

“Morning, Red! Wowie, you’re up early!”

If Red had had skin, he would’ve jumped out of it. As it stood, he just jumped. But only one person — Blue — didn’t have an indoors voice, so Red’s panic was short-lived. It may have been unfortunate that Blue was the first one up, though, or that Red didn’t have the foresight to expect this.

“Mornin’,” he said, eyelights darting to the wall, each time he came close to looking at Blue, “couldn’t sleep.”

And just like that, the atmosphere turned uncomfortable. Or maybe it just felt like that to Red; Blue didn’t seem affected. He hummed and moved past the other to get to the fridge.

“Maybe some food will make you feel better?” he offered as he pulled out a carton of eggs.

Not trusting whatever would come out of his mouth, Red just nodded. Blue lit up with a smile, set the eggs onto the counter and pulled out a pan. Really, Red should’ve been getting used to it by now, but it still just… hit him like a freight train — the fact that Blue would get so happy about something Red would say, or do.

It was taking him a while to wrap his mind around being cared about. His own brother admitting he cared about Red hadn’t fully sunk in yet, but then Blue had to join the  _ confuse-Red-with-feelings _ club with his admission (was that even the right word for what had happened?) yesterday. Which, in turn, technically, meant that Stretch cared about him in some capacity, too. That was three people too many for what Red was used to, expected, or deserved.

He promised Blue he’d think about the… proposal, but with Edge off on what, in his eyes, amounted to a suicide mission, he hadn’t even had the time to honor the promise. Fuck, did Red hate promises. They always came with a whole load of baggage, and he already had a ton of his own. Was it even a promise if he didn’t say ‘I promise’?

“How do you want your eggs?” Blue asked, pulling Red’s attention to himself. Their gazes met for a split second, and even that brief moment had Red scrambling to look away. Back out of the window at the soft fall of snow, where it was safe to look. It was stupid, nothing would happen if he looked at Blue, and he  _ knew  _ that, logically, he  _ did _ . But he still didn’t look.

Instead, he offered a very eloquent, “Uh,” because he’d never seen Blue cook anything that wasn’t a taco, or lasagna on that one occasion that Edge had been teaching him the importance of intent in food.

“I like mine scrambled,” Blue elaborated as he cracked two of them into the pan.

“I’ll take scrambled, too,” Red conceded with a shrug, and moved to the fridge. For how much Blue condemned Stretch’s habit of drinking honey, a bottle of mustard had materialized in the fridge a couple of days ago. Red was not going to look a gifted horse in the mouth. He grabbed it and took a gulp before putting it back, for later.

Blue cracked three more eggs onto the pan and reached for a spatula. Red watched each and every one of his moves, apparently not having the same restraints as he did about looking at his face.

It only took a few moments for Blue to scramble them to his satisfaction, and yet those few moments felt like an eternity to Red as he watched. There was something mesmerizing about Blue, and he allowed himself to admit it, if only in the privacy of his own mind. He was shorter than Red, by a fair few inches, but his whole demeanor, the way he held himself, his brightness, it all made him seem so much bigger than he really was.

And when he turned to Red with that wide grin of him, the likes of which Red hadn’t even thought possible until he’d seen it on his face, Red forgot all about not looking at him. “It’s done,” Blue said, and it took a while for Red to connect the words with the soft movement of his teeth. “Hand me the plates?”

Numbly, he nodded and reached into the cupboard to grab a pair of plates to hand them over. Blue’s phalanges touched his as he took them, and Red had to grit his teeth.

Blue could do so much better than a freak like him. He deserved someone better, someone who would love him like it was normal in this universe, and not… Red’s facsimile of the idea.

Or maybe he was just scared; scared he’d fuck up, and hurt this version of himself that was a walking example of what he could’ve been, if only the circumstances were different. 

Oh, but how stupid would he have to be to pass up such an opportunity? It should’ve been a no-brainer, he should’ve jumped on the chance, let himself be as selfish as always. You never knew when any good thing would be torn from your grasp, after all.

So why didn’t he?

Blue took the eggs to the table and sat down, sprinkling salt onto his own plate. Red forgot all about the bottle of mustard still in the fridge as he sat opposite of him, eyelights still glued to the soft grin on Blue’s face, the star shapes his eyelights took. 

He  _ wanted _ to be selfish. He wanted to grip at this little piece of a good thing that the universe deigned to grace him with, and never let it go. What’s the worst that could happen, anyway?

He shoves a forkful of eggs into his mouth and has to grit his teeth as the intent hits him, for a completely different reason than the first time. It wasn’t so concentrated; Blue was a good student, or maybe Edge was just a good teacher, but there was only a very thin layer of it, underneath the pepper Blue had ground onto them. It’s soft and it’s warm and it feels like  _ home _ , like a hug.

Red’s sockets threatened to fill with tears the more he ate, and Blue was looking at him with drawn browbones, obviously wanting to ask him if anything was wrong (or, knowing him, to ask if he’d fucked up the intent or something), and now Red knew how he’d answer Blue’s proposal.

When the eggs were gone from both their plates, and Blue was getting up to take the dishes to the sink, Red stood up as well, teeth parting around a sentence that he hadn’t constructed yet.

But the universe decided that it wasn’t the time, or maybe that he’d come to a wrong conclusion in his confused state, because the front door opened and in walked Edge, immediately pulling both their gazes with his self-assured gait and crossed arms. He looked like the cat that got the cream, and Red could imagine how the night had gone for him.

“So,” he drawled, rolling his eyelights, “how’d it go?”

Edge’s grin was wide and under normal circumstances, Red would’ve done something to piss him off, to wipe it off. “I am so glad you asked, brother! You are looking at the Underground’s newest sentry!”

“Yeah? An’  _ how _ ’d it go? Did she tell ya ta fuck off? An’ ya had to wait ‘til the mornin’?”

“That is completely irrelevant!” Which, when translated from Edge speak, meant ‘yes, but I don’t want to dwell on it.’ So Alphys wasn’t that different from Undyne. Thank the stars for it, too. Red wasn’t sure anyone would appreciate it if he had to dust her for hurting Edge.

“Congratulations!” Blue chipped in, pulling Red’s attention. Though his voice was genuine and loud, there was a flicker of something akin to disappointment on his face, the stars gone from his sockets. “I’m sure you’ll do great!”

Edge scoffed. “Of course I will! If the bar is set by Stretch, then I don’t even need to do anything out of the ordinary.”

“Please don’t say that about Papy, he… does his best!”

Red’s marrow felt like it was boiling in his bones; he clenched his hands into fists and stood up, and found himself shortcutting away before either of them had a chance to say one more word.

He found himself in Waterfall, with a thumping soul and a scowl on his face. He wasn’t thinking when he shortcutted, and he still wasn’t thinking as he stalked towards Alphys’ house, only one thing on his mind, and that thing was Blue’s disappointment.

He knocked on the toothed door, only mildly surprised when it opened not a moment later. Alphys stood in it, in just a tanktop and jeans, her armor nowhere to be seen, and her face split with a grin when she saw him.

“Edge told me to expect you,” she said, folding her arms over her chest. “He already negotiated on your behalf—”

“I ain’t here fer myself,” Red cut her off, glancing off to the side. “Are ya ever gonna let Blu— Sans inta the Guard?”

Alphys blinked, her visible bro jumping up in obvious surprise. “I—” she stammered, and then looked around herself before pulling Red inside. It was only when the door closed behind him with a metallic clang that she answered. “I don’t know.”

“What’dya  _ mean  _ y’don’t know?”

“It’s just— Ugh! He’s not  _ weak _ , he’s actually strong as hell, but… He’s too nice for his own good. I can’t let him join the Royal Guard! He’d get torn apart by the first threat, and he’d probably do it with a smile while trying to befriend it! He even befriended  _ you  _ and your brother, despite you being murderers!”

“I dunno, yer pretty chummy with Edge,” Red shot back, unphased.

“And it’s all Sans’ fault!” Alphys roared. Red was surprised she didn’t summon an axe to break over something; his Undyne would have. “I just— I can’t do that to him!”

“But y’wanna make him happy, right?”

“He’s my friend, of course I do.”

“Then howzabout this,” Red proposed, teeth tugging up into a lopsided grin, “Y’let ‘im be a sentry. An’ I’ll keep an  _ eyesocket  _ out on ‘im. I ain’t got the same reservations as ‘im.”

“What, that’s—” Alphys cut herself off, actually thinking about it. Red let her and leaned against the door as he waited. She pinned him there with a heated stare that did next to nothing to someone like him. “If anything,  _ anything  _ happens to him…”

Red’s grin turned rueful. Oh, how he hated promises. But for Blue, just this once, he would make a proper one. “I promise ta keep ‘im safe.”

Alphys seemed to study him, her eye rowing him up and down. Eventually, she seemed satisfied with whatever she wanted, and nodded. “Alright. Alright. Fine! But you’re responsible if— and don’t think I’ll hesitate to dust you, you hear?!”

Red was already halfway out of the house by the second ‘alright’. He got what he came for.

He didn’t know how long he’d been gone, but it couldn’t have been more than half an hour. When he came back, Edge was nowhere to be seen, and Blue was back in the kitchen, with his back to Red, hunched over another pan. His shoulders might’ve been shaking, but Red tried not to pay attention to it.

“Hey,” he greeted, making Blue jump and turn around with a startled yelp. “I uh… went ta Alphys’.”

“O-oh! Well, Edge already left. And he took Papy along, so…”

That must’ve been a sight, Red thought to himself. But no, as much as the mental image of Edge dragging Stretch out of his bed amused him, it wasn’t what he cared about it at the moment.

“Alphys let me inta the Guard,” Red said, and hastily, before Blue’s expression could do a repeat performance of that crest-falledness, he added, “as yer partner.”

He could almost see the wheelwork turning inside Blue’s cranium, and the moment his sockets flew wide open and teeth parted in awe would forever sear itself into Red’s memory. Not a moment later, there were arms around his neck and Blue’s skull buried into his hood, and he could hear soft sobs muffled through the fabric, and he didn’t know what to do.

“I uh…” he stammered, hesitantly putting a hand onto the small of Blue’s back where he could feel exactly how hard his ribcage shook.

“Thank you!” was the first coherent thing Blue said — though yelled might’ve been a better word for it — into the crook of his neck, and that Red could understand, his arms tightening to the point of being almost painful. But Red didn’t mind.

“Heh. Yer welcome, sweetheart,” he muttered, unable to stop his own smile. “An’ I also… uh…” The words died in his non-existent throat, feeling too dry. He wasn’t sure he knew how to say something like this.

Eventually, Blue untangled himself from Red and wiped at his face furiously, smearing the blue magic over his cheekbones as Red looked away and pretended not to see. His soul hammered in his ribcage like it was trying to force its way out, feeling too hot and too big for it.

It was a heady feeling. Red wasn’t sure he ever wanted it to stop.

He took a deep breath.

“I’d uh— I’d also love ta spar with ya, Blue.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you can talk to me on [tumblr](https://armethaumaturgy.tumblr.com/) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/esqers)


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